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100 Parenting Quotes To Encourage And Inspire You

By Maxime Lagacé

Maxime is the founder of WisdomQuotes. He has been collecting quotes since 2004. His goal? To help you develop a calm and peaceful mind. Learn more about him on his about page .

Here are 100 of the most inspiring parenting quotes I could find. The goal? To encourage you and help you raise wise, loving, and happy kids. You’ll discover quotes by Fred Rogers, Jordan Peterson, Dalai Lama, and more. Enjoy!

We have to prepare the child for the path, not the path for the child. Tim Elmore

When you teach your son, you teach your son’s son. The Talmud

To be a parent is to be chief designer of a product more advanced than any technology and more interesting than the greatest work of art. Alain de Botton

Evidence of good parenting: the child has no desire to be famous. Alain de Botton

Your children need your presence more than your presents. Jesse Jackson

My goal is not to be liked, it’s to raise loving and responsible kids. Maxime Lagacé

A lot of parents will do anything for their kids, except let them be themselves. Banksy

I don’t think anyone can grow unless he’s loved exactly as he is now, appreciated for what he is rather than what he will be. Fred Rogers

Don’t handicap your children by making their lives easy. Robert A. Heinlein

Your children will reap what you sow. Virgil

Instead of buying your children all the things you never had, you should teach them all the things you were never taught. Material wears out but knowledge stays. Bruce Lee

We cannot always build the future for our youth, but we can build our youth for the future. Franklin D. Roosevelt

A mother is she who can take the place of all others but whose place no one else can take. Cardinal Meymillod

Someone’s sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago. Warren Buffett

It is a wise father that knows his own child. William Shakespeare

• 110 Family Quotes To Inspire Closeness With Your Relatives
• 100 Lovely Children Quotes To Inspire You
• 110 Love Quotes To Bring More Vitality To Your Life

The Best Parenting Quotes

Never help a child with a task at which he feels he can succeed. Maria Montessori

We’re a nation of exhausted and overstressed adults raising overscheduled children. Brené Brown

Question for parents: do you want to make your children safe, or strong? Jordan Peterson ( 12 Rules for Life , Amazon book)

A father is a man who expects his son to be as good a man as he meant to be. Frank A. Clark

My understanding of the way a child grows is that you create the garden, you don’t grow the flower. You can merely fertilize the earth and keep it soft and moist, and then the flower grows as best it can. Ram Dass

Insanity is hereditary; you get it from your children. Sam Levenson

Every child should be taught that life is unfair so that we don’t end up with a bunch of adults who act like the world owes them something. Preethi Kasireddy

The task isn’t to tell children that they are amazing, it’s to model for them how one might live a very decent, self-accepting, humour filled and confident life knowing one isn’t anything of the sort – but fortunately, no one else is either. Alain de Botton ( Related : How to Lend a Child Confidence , theschooloflife.com)

The task of a parent: to acclimatise the child to the true (often horrific) nature of reality without it giving up hope or the will to live. Alain de Botton

Tell kids stories about your failures. Tim Elmore

The best way, perhaps the only way, to change others is to become an example. Naval Ravikant

The greatest gifts you can give your children are the roots of responsibility and the wings of independence. Denis Waitley

The experience of raising young children – when they’re happy, you’re happy. Naval Ravikant

True, unconditional, love is the province of parents and saints. Naval Ravikant

You can’t be wrong if you teach your kids playing, creating, listening, but most of all, loving. Maxime Lagacé

Children have never been very good at listening to their elders, but they have never failed to imitate them. James Baldwin

You have a lifetime to work, but children are only young once. Polish proverb

One of the universal fears of childhood is the fear of not having value in the eyes of the people whom we admire so much. Fred Rogers

Play is often talked about as if it were a relief from serious learning. But for children play is serious learning. Play is really the work of childhood. Fred Rogers

6-year-olds should play outside and ask questions, not sit on a chair and memorize answers. Johnny Uzan

The best way of killing a rose is to force it open when it is still only the promise of a bud. José Saramago (The Cave)

You’re only as happy as your unhappiest child. Andrew Rae

Parenthood is a great way to develop a leader’s mentality. Whatever the circumstances, there’s always one pair of eyes looking up to you. Johnny Uzan

If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales . If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales. Albert Einstein

Every father should remember one day his son will follow his example, not his advice. Charles Kettering

Children are a poor man’s riches. English proverb

Part 2. Parenting Quotes That Are…

The most famous parenting quotes.

Go to table of contents

At the end of the day my most important job is still mom-in-chief. Michelle Obama

A mother’s arms are made of tenderness and children sleep soundly in them. Victor Hugo

Spend more time smiling than frowning and more time praising than criticizing. Richard Branson (Virgin)

Your child will learn more from your beautiful thinking, talking and behaviour than anything else in the world. Yoko Ono

It is time for parents to teach young people early on that in diversity there is beauty and there is strength. Maya Angelou

Use your success, wealth and influence to put them in the best position to realize their own dreams and find their true purpose. Put them through school, set them up with job interviews and help them become leaders in their own right. Hold them to the same level of hard work and dedication that it took for you to get to where you are now, and where you will eventually go. Kobe Bryant

Let parents bequeath to their children not riches, but the spirit of reverence. Plato

I am convinced that every effort must be made in childhood to teach the young to use their own minds. For one thing is sure: If they don’t make up their minds, someone will do it for them. Eleanor Roosevelt

I wish with all my heart that every child could be so imbued with a sense of the adventure of life that each change, each readjustment, each surprise – good or bad – that came along would be welcomed as part of the whole enthralling experience. Eleanor Roosevelt

When a man dies, if he can pass enthusiasm along to his children, he has left them an estate of incalculable value. Thomas Edison

There is only one pretty child in the world, and every mother has it. Chinese proverb

You may give them your love but not your thoughts, for they have their own thoughts. Kahlil Gibran (The Prophet)

Parents can only give good advice or put them on the right paths, but the final forming of a person’s character lies in their own hands. Anne Frank

Modern education is premised strongly on materialistic values. It is vital that when educating our children’s brains that we do not neglect to educate their hearts, a key element of which has to be the nurturing of our compassionate nature. 14th Dalai Lama

More kids are ruined by the behavior of their parents than by the amount they inherit. Children learn from your actions. Warren Buffett

It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men. Frederick Douglas

We must do everything in our power to cease the behaviour that makes children everywhere feel afraid. Alice Walker

Treat people as if they were what they ought to be and you help them to become what they are capable of being. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently. Friedrich Nietzsche (The Dawn)

I cannot think of any need in childhood as strong as the need for a father’s protection. Sigmund Freud

Educate your children to self-control , to the habit of holding passion and prejudice and evil tendencies subject to an upright and reasoning will, and you have done much to abolish misery from their future and crimes from society. Benjamin Franklin

Do I want to be a hero to my son? No, I would like to be a very real human being. That’s hard enough. Robert Downey Jr

If you have never been hated by your child, you have never been a parent. Bette Davis

Short Parenting Quotes

Let kids be kids. David Perell

Encourage talking. David Perell

Kids spell love T-I-M-E. John Crudele

Everything depends on upbringing. Leo Tolstoy (War and Peace)

Teach your kids that talent doesn’t exist and that people who persevere are the wise ones. Maxime Lagacé

Noble fathers have noble children. Euripides

Their lives should be good, not easy. @DailyDadEmail

Strengthen a parent and you strengthen a child. Fred Rogers

A parents words become the children’s thoughts. Bill Masur

Children empty our pockets and fill our souls. Tim Fargo

One father is more than a hundred schoolmasters. George Herbert

A boy needs a father to show him how to be in the world. Ian Morgan Cron

Parenting is hard. You did, and are still doing, a great job. Becky Kennedy

Most parents : “Be safe”. Wise parents : “Become strong”. Fateh Singh

The way we talk to our children becomes their inner voice. Peggy O’Mara

There are not perfect parents just as there are no perfect children. Fred Rogers

How do you celebrate your kids’ failures? Maxime Lagacé

The child supplies the power but the parents have to do the steering. Benjamin Spock

No amount of money will buy back missed time with your kids. Save Your Sons ( Source )

Your kids are wildflowers. Give them the right environment. Maxime Lagacé

My father didn’t tell me how to live. He lived and let me watch him do it. Clarence Budington Kelland

Each day of our lives we make deposits in the memory banks of our children. Charles R. Swindoll

The love you give your kids will travel several generations into the future. Thibaut

Children aren’t coloring books. You don’t get to fill them with your favorite colors. Khaled Hosseini

Helpful Parenting Sayings (Tips For Parents)

High standards, consistency, but most importantly, unconditional love, is what will help you raise good kids. Maxime Lagacé

You really have to be yourself. The best thing that you can do, for anybody, is just to offer one more honest adult in their lives. Fred Rogers

You cannot fix your children and you cannot plan their lives. You can guide, support, nurture and love them in the best way you can. Iyanla Vanzant

Stop telling children what to think and start teaching them how to think. Anthony Pompliano

Make your kids think otherwise society will do it for them. Maxime Lagacé

When parents are too hands-on, kids fail to learn self-reliance. Instead of hovering like a helicopter parent, try submarine parenting : give kids the freedom to explore and surface if there’s a distress signal. Adam Grant

Snowplow parents prepare the road for kids. Responsible parents prepare kids for the road. Resilience is built not by eliminating struggle, but by normalizing it. Teach kids to see obstacles as temporary hurdles. Adam Grant

Parents focus too much on grades and goals, and too little on generosity. Kids raised to be kind are more successful in school and work — and happier too. At family dinner, don’t just ask kids what they achieved. Ask who they helped and who helped them. Adam Grant

These six words can save your child so much unnecessary pain: “I love you as you are”. Scott Barry Kaufman

Teach your kids about money before they’re old enough to earn their own. Morgan Housel

There’s someone around you who looks up to you. They may be struggling, full of doubt or afraid. You can change their life with four words. “I believe in you”. Said at the right time, those are the most powerful words in the world. Johnny Uzan

If you want to inhibit kids’ growth, keep telling them they are smart. If you want to give compliments and nurture growth, praise their curiosity and efforts. Unknown

Best parenting advice I can give: Get your own sh*t together so you pass on as little of your own baggage as possible. The less weight your kids start with the more opportunities they’ll have. Mark Allan Bovair

Kids will follow your example. Not your advice. Don’t just tell them to: do more physical activity, eat healthier food, get outside more, do the right thing, be kind to others, read books. Make sure you are doing these things so your kids will follow. Lead by example. Jack Coulson

Being in shape is one of the greatest gifts you’ll ever give your children. Dan Go

The goal of raising children should be to create adults with the proper balance of self-love and discipline. Bill Masur

Related :  Positive Parenting Tips (Organized by age, cdc.gov)

Anything that we can do to help foster the intellect and spirit and emotional growth of our fellow human beings, that is our job. Those of us who have this particular vision must continue against all odds. Life is for service. Fred Rogers

Key Takeaways

• The true present is your whole presence
• Help your kids by not helping them too much
• Your kids are wildflowers, not bonsai trees: let them play, let them make mistakes, and let them grow as they are
• Perseverance is more important than talent
• Humility is beautiful
• Failing is useful
• Best parenting style? Authoritative Parenting (In other words, “be firm, but warm”)

Further Readings

• Topic: Relationships
• 139 Relationship Quotes To Level Up Your Bonding With Others
• 100 Respect Quotes To Create More Unity In The World
• 83 Listening Quotes To Help You Be A Better Listener
• Guide to Parenting (psychologytoday.com)
• How to Be a Modern Parent (nytimes.com)
• 100 Trust Quotes To Bring More Certainty (In Life and Work)
• 70 Kindness Quotes To Make The World Better
• 62 Tolerance Quotes To Inspire Harmony

Hope you enjoyed these beautiful parenting quotes. If you did, please share them with a friend today!

Do you consider yourself a good parent? What’s your favorite parenting quote? And remember: words can transform your life, if you find the right ones.

Table Of Contents

Part 1 Top 15 Images Best Quotes

Part 2 Parenting Quotes That ARE Famous Short Inspirational Helpful

Part 3 Conclusion

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25 Best Short Quotes on Parents – Inspiring & Uplifting

Short quotes on parents are to inspire and educate us. They are  also to guide us on he path to being reflective parents .

Quotes are great at doing this as they help us dive deep without consuming too much bandwith!

25 short quotes on parents

We can never know the love of parents until we become parents. – Henry Ward Beecher

Children are apt to live up to what you believe of them.–Lady Bird Johnson

Anyone can be a father, but it takes someone special to be a dad.

“Kids don’t need a perfect mama. They need a happy one.”

“What a child doesn’t receive, he can later seldom give.”

“Be the parent today that you want your kids to remember tomorrow.”

“It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men.” –Frederick Douglass

“There is no such thing as a perfect parent. So just be a real one.” — Sue Atkins

“Don’t worry that children never listen to you; worry that they are always watching you.”— Robert Fulghum

When you teach your son, you teach your son’s son. The Talmud

What kids need

Family means nobody gets left behind or forgotten.” — David Ogden Stiers

Your children need your presence more than your presents. Jesse Jackson

“As your kids grow up, they may forget what you said, but they won’t forget how you made them feel.”— Kevin Heath

“Biology is the least of what makes someone a mother.” — Oprah Winfrey

“Parenthood…it’s about guiding the next generation and forgiving the last.” — Peter Krause

Your children will reap what you sow. Virgil

Tell kids stories about your failures. Tim Elmore

You have a lifetime to work, but children are only young once. Polish proverb

You’re only as happy as your unhappiest child. Andrew Rae

When a man dies, if he can pass enthusiasm along to his children, he has left them an estate of incalculable value. Thomas Edison

Good parenting give headaches but bad parenting gives heartaches.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts, for they have their own thoughts. Kahlil Gibran (The Prophet)

quotes on bad parenting

• “Bad parenting is not about bad parents but about bad parenting habits.” – Dr. Laura Markham
• “Children learn more from what you are than what you teach.” – W.E.B. Du Bois
• “The worst thing you can do for your kids is do everything for them.” – Tom Culley
• “Bad parenting creates problems that must be fixed by good parenting.” – Dr. Phil McGraw
• “Parents who overindulge their children often have the same kind of children as those who neglect them.” – J.D. Salinger
• “Parents who are overly controlling, authoritarian, or neglectful can inadvertently set their children up for a range of emotional and behavioral difficulties.” – Amy Morin
• “You can’t blame the parents too much. After all, they are products of their own upbringing.” – Hedy Lamarr
• “If you don’t want your children to inherit your mistakes, then don’t repeat them.” – Dr. Richard Carlson
• “Bad parenting is like bad weather; it doesn’t matter whether it’s raining or sunny, it’s going to impact you one way or another.” – Shannon L. Alder
• “Parents can only give good advice or put them on the right paths, but the final forming of a person’s character lies in their own hands.” – Anne Frank
• Dysfunctional parents gives headaches but bad parenting gives heartaches

You can find many more bad parenting quotes here

All parents need a little motivation  and these short quotes on parents help!

Lots of parents (all parents?) struggle to stay motivated all the time no matter how much they love thier children. Parenting is a huge reponsibility. Sometimes we need to have a lifttle inspirational reminder of why we are so invested.

Love quotes about mothers

How to use short quotes on parents and parenting

Short quotes can be used effectively in a variety of contexts to convey a concise and impactful message. Here are some ways and places where you can use short quotes:

• Social Media Posts : Short quotes are perfect for sharing on platforms like Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook. They can capture attention quickly and fit within character limits.
• Presentations and Speeches : Use short quotes to add emphasis or provide a thought-provoking insight in your presentations or speeches. They can break up the content and make it more engaging.
• Writing : Incorporate short quotes into your essays, articles, or blog posts to provide authority, support your arguments, or add depth to your writing.
• Personal Blog or Website : If you have a personal blog or website, short quotes can serve as attention-grabbing headers, section dividers, or thought starters.
• Inspiration and Motivation : Share short inspirational or motivational quotes on bulletin boards, in emails, or on motivational posters to uplift and inspire others.
• Cards and Notes : Use short quotes in greeting cards, thank-you notes, or messages to add a personal touch and convey your feelings succinctly.
• Marketing and Advertising : Incorporate short quotes in marketing materials, advertisements, or promotional content to convey key messages or create a memorable tagline.
• Personal Development : Keep a collection of your favorite short quotes in a journal or digital note-taking app for moments when you need a quick boost of inspiration or reflection.
• Art and Design : Use short quotes as captions for artwork, illustrations, or photographs. They can complement the visual elements and add depth to your creations.
• Conversation Starters : Share a short quote in a conversation to spark discussions or convey your perspective on a particular topic.

Further reading

Childhood friendship quotes

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45 Positive parenting quotes that are inspirational

Positive parenting quotes to encourage moms and dads.

Parenthood is wearisome and wonderful. It is exhausting and exhilarating. Sometimes on the bad days just knowing that you aren’t in it alone is encouraging. 

For that reason, I’ve put together a list of 45 inspirational parenting quotes to encourage and amuse you along your parenting journey.

You’ll find a mix of inspirational quotes, funny parenting quotes about real family life and even some good advice. 

Through my years as a mom, I’ve learned there is no such thing as perfect parenting. But, we can all work hard to be the best parent we can be.

At the end of the day, what matters most is our unconditional love for our children. The most powerful way we can raise a good kid is simply giving our kids much love and much time. 

Whether new parents or seasoned parents, we’re all in this together!

Inspirational parenting quotes

“Encourage and support your kids because children are apt to live up to what you believe of them.” — Lady Bird Johnson, former First Lady of the United States

“You’re on a long journey. You’ll have good days and bad. And sometimes they happen all in the same day. Don’t get bogged down by the bad moments. Know that it really is worth it and whatever phase you’re in really does end.” — Stacey A. Shannon, journalist and blogger in “ 60 Motherhood truths “

“Behind every young child who believes in himself is a parent who believed first.” — Matthew Jacobson, blogger

“Affirming words from moms and dads are like light switches. Speak a word of affirmation at the right moment in a child’s life and it’s like lighting up a whole roomful of possibilities.” — Gary Smalley, family therapist

“There’s no way to be a perfect mother and a million ways to be a good one.” — Jill Churchill, author

“While we try to teach our children all about life, our children teach us what life is all about.” — Angela Schwindt, a mom and coach

“There are many ways to measure success; not the least of which is the way your child describes you when talking to a friend.” — Anonymous

“My children aren’t a burden or annoyance; they are my greatest masterpiece.” — Stacey A. Shannon, journalist and blogger in “ Back to school blues “

“Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he will not depart from it.” — Proverbs 22:6 KJV

“Making the decision to have a child — it’s momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body.” — Elizabeth Stone, author

“A good father is one of the most unsung, unpraised, unnoticed, and yet one of the most valuable assets in our society.” — Billy Graham, evangelist

“So often, children are punished for being human. They are not allowed to have grumpy moods, bad days, disrespectful tones, or bad attitudes. Yet, we adults have them all the time. None of us are perfect. We must stop holding our children to a higher standard of perfection than we can attain ourselves. ” — Rebecca Eanes, author and positive parenting advocate

“Great memories are often made in the small moments. The greatest gift you give your children is your time.” — Stacey A. Shannon, journalist and blogger

“There is no such thing as a perfect parent. So just be a real one.” — Sue Atkins, parenting coach

“As a mother, my job is to take care of the possible and trust God with the impossible.” — Ruth Bell Graham, author

“We’re all wondering if we’re messing up our kids or even being good parents. Moms everywhere doubt their abilities and choices. We worry if our kids are OK and fret over whether we’re spending time doing the right things with them. We are doing the best we can in the midst of the chaos and exhaustion.” — Stacey A. Shannon, journalist and blogger

“Your kids require you most of all to love them for who they are, not to spend your whole time trying to correct them.” — Bill Ayers, elementary education reformist

“The best way to make children good is to make them happy.” — Oscar Wilde, author

“We never know the love of the parent till we become parents ourselves.” — Henry Ward Beecher, minister

“Each day of our lives we make deposits into the memory banks of our children.” — Charles R. Swindoll, pastor

“Children are not a distraction from more important work. They are the most important work.” — C.S. Lewis, writer

“Childhood is fleeting, so let kids be kids and cherish the time you have together.” — Abraham Lincoln, 16th U.S. President

“A Mother’s Promise” “ I will love you completely and fully no matter what you do. I will work hard to make sure you get any help you need. I will always be your soft place to land. I will pray over and for you as long as there is breath in my body. I will protect you to the very best of my ability. I will be there to lift you up when life kicks you down. I will be your biggest fan forever and always in everything you do. I will fail and make mistakes, but I will always do my best. I will forever be thankful and grateful that I get to be your mom. “ — Stacey A. Shannon, journalist and blogger

“Your children need your presence more than your presents.” — Jesse Jackson, civil rights activist 

“Our greatest national resource is the minds of our children.” — Walt Disney, cartoonist

“Giving birth is little more than a set of muscular contractions granting passage of a child. Then the mother is born.” ― Erma Bombeck, newspaper humor columnist

“The way we talk to our children becomes their inner voice.” ― Peggy O’Mara, journalist and publisher

“You will lose yourself for a while after the baby is born, but you’ll come back. Slowly, over time, you become more you again, yet different in a way you’re OK with.” ― Stacey A. Shannon, journalist and blogger in “ 60 Motherhood truths to inspire you and make you laugh “

“To be in your children’s memories tomorrow, you have to be in their lives today.” ― Barbara Johnson, literary critic

“The most important thing that parents can teach their children is how to get along without them.” ― Frank A. Clark, radio broadcaster and writer

Humorous parenting quotes

“Everyone should have kids. They are the greatest joy in the world. But they are also terrorists. You’ll realize this as soon as they’re born, and they start using sleep deprivation to break you.” — Ray Romano, actor and comedian

“I came to parenting the way most of us do — knowing nothing and trying to learn everything.” — Mayim Bialik ,  actress and neuroscientist

“You can learn many things from children. How much patience you have, for instance.” — Franklin P. Adams, columnist

“Cleaning your house while your kids are still growing is like shoveling the walk before it stops snowing.” — Phyllis Diller, actress and comedian

“Having a child is like getting a tattoo … on your face. You better be committed.” — Elizabeth Gilbert, journalist

“The thing about parenting rules is there aren’t any. That’s what makes it so difficult.” ― Ewan McGregor, actor

“Don’t worry that children never listen to you; worry that they are always watching you.” — Robert Fulghum, author

Real family life parenting quotes

“Parenthood…It’s about guiding the next generation, and forgiving the last.” ― Peter Krause, in the American T.V. series “Parenthood”

“Motherhood is a constant learning process that requires flexibility and a sense of humor. And just when you think you have it all figured out, your children like to remind you that you certainly don’t.” — Stacey A. Shannon, journalist and blogger in “ Motherhood requires a sense of humor “

“It is time for a return to childhood, to simplicity, to running and climbing and laughing in the sunshine, to experiencing happiness instead of being trained for a lifetime of pursuing happiness. It is time to let children be children again.” ― L.R. Knost, author and social justice activist

“No man can know where he is going unless he knows exactly where he has been and exactly how he arrived at his present place.” — Maya Angelou, author and poet

“What the world needs is not romantic lovers who are sufficient unto themselves, but husbands and wives who live in communities, relate to other people, carry on useful work and willingly give time and attention to their children.” ― Margaret Mead, anthropologist

“A broken family is a family in which any member must break herself into pieces to fit in. A whole family is one in which each member can bring her full self to the table knowing that she will always be both held and free.” ― Glennon Doyle, author

“You’ll have many moments when your husband, your children and your dog all need something from you at the exact same time. This is usually when you’re doing a frivolous activity like making dinner or washing laundry or going to the bathroom.” ― Stacey A. Shannon, journalist and blogger in “ 60 Motherhood truths to inspire you and make you laugh “

“The family. We were a strange little band of characters trudging through life sharing diseases and toothpaste, coveting one another’s desserts, hiding shampoo, borrowing money, locking each other out of our rooms, inflicting pain and kissing to heal it in the same instant, loving, laughing, defending, and trying to figure out the common thread that bound us all together.” ― Erma Bombeck, newspaper humor columnist

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48 Inspiring Positive Parenting Quotes on Raising Kids and Being a Better Parent

These thirty-five positive parenting quotes will inspire you to build a more peaceful and loving relationship with your child – a relationship that research shows results in better outcomes for both parent and child.

Positive parenting – also known as authoritative, peaceful parenting or positive discipline – is defined as: “ Positive parenting is focused on developing a strong, deeply committed relationship between parent and child based on communication and mutual respect. Positive Parenting focuses on teaching children not just what but also why. Positive parenting means training children toward self-control. “

This type of parenting is in contrast with authoritarian parenting that is very demanding but lacks warmth or connection.

Authoritative parents tend to be impatient with children’s misbehavior and children are allowed few choices or have little say in outcomes. Research shows that children raised by authoritative parents associate obedience with success, are fearful of social interactions, and have low self-esteem.

Positive parenting is also in contrast with passive or permissive parenting .

A passive parent allows their child lots of freedom to do whatever they want, with little discipline. Research shows that children who are raised by passive parents may have trouble socially, tend to be rebellious, and may have trouble in school or later in life holding a job.

Want to see more positive parenting quotes? Follow Self-Sufficient Kids on Instagram to see a new quote every day. (Click on the image below to be taken to Instagram)

35 favorite positive parenting quotes on Self-Sufficient Kids’ Instagram page

The following quotes are the most popular quotes on Self-Sufficient Kids’ Instagram page according to likes, saves, and comments.

While the quotes below aren’t all specifically highlighting positive parenting as a philosophy, they all fall within the realm of what it means to be a positive parent.

“By loving them for more than their abilities we show our children that they are much more than the sum of their accomplishments.” – Eileen Kennedy-Moore

“The most powerful way to change the world is to live in front of our children the way we would like the world to be.” – Graham White

“To be in your children’s memories tomorrow, you have to be in their lives today.” – Barbara Johnson

“There is no such thing as a perfect parent so just be a real one.” – Sue Atkins

“We must remember that one day our children are going to follow our example instead of our advice.” – Carolina King

“If your children fear you, they cannot trust you. If they don’t trust you, they cannot learn from you.” – Lori Petro

“So often children are punished for being human. Children are not allowed to have grumpy moods, bad days, disrespectful tones, or bad attitudes. Yet, us adults have them all the time. None of us are perfect. We must stop holding our children to a higher standard of perfection than we can attain ourselves.” – Rebecca Eanes

“The point of parenting is not to have all the answers before we start out but instead to figure it out on the go as our children grow. Because as they do, so will we.” – Bridgett Miller

“Your kids require you most of all to love them for who they are, not to spend your whole time trying to correct them.” – Bill Ayers

“Remember you are not managing an inconvenience. You are raising a human being.” – Kittie Franz

“A child seldom needs a good talking to as much as a good listening to.” – Robert Brault

“Where did we ever get the crazy idea that in order to make children do better, first we have to make them feel worse? Think of the last time you felt humiliated or treated unfairly. Did you feel like cooperating or doing better?” – Jane Nelsen

“We are apt to forget that children watch examples better than they listen to preaching.” – Roy L. Smith

“Don’t worry that children never listen to you; worry that they are always watching you.” – Robert Fulghum

“ 13 things children need more of: unstructured play, nature, hugs, freedom to explore, playtime with parents, laughter, simplicity, belief in their goodness, daily rhythms and rituals, expressed gratitude for who they are, a calm environment, compassion, a shoulder to cry on.”

To raise a child who is comfortable enough to leave you means you’ve done a good job. They are not ours to keep but to teach how to soar on their own. – Unknown

“Many believe parenting is about controlling children’s behavior and training them to act like adults. I believe that parenting is about controlling my own behavior and acting like an adult myself. Children learn what they live and live what they learn.” – L.R. Knost

“If I expect my children to be kind, gentle, compassionate, and respectful, I must be kind, gentle, compassionate, and respectful. Children do not listen to the instruction of hypocrites; it is your actions that guide their actions, not your lectures or punishment.” – Rebecca Eanes

“Children are not a distraction from more important work. They are the most important work.” – C.S. Lewis

“You can’t teach children to behave better by making them feel worse. When children feel better, they behave better.” – Pam Leo

“You do not have to make your children into wonderful people. You just have to remind them that they are wonderful people.” – William Martin

“If halfwa y through disciplining your child, you realize you are overreacting, it is OK to stop. It is OK to tell them ‘sorry’. It is OK to admit that you overreacted and tell them you’ve had a bad day causing a knee-jerk reaction. It doesn’t mean you’ve failed. It is showing your child that you can admit when you’re wrong.”

“The sign of great parenting is not the child’s behavior. The sign of truly great parenting is the parent’s behavior.” – Andy Smithson

If you really want your children to respect you, let them speak! Give them a safe space to say how they really feel without fear of how your pride will react. It doesn’t matter if they are always right or “good”, it matters that they are allowed to be real with you. – Brook Hampton

Seven things every child needs to hear: 1. I love you. 2. I’m proud of you. 3. I’m sorry. 4. I forgive you. 5. I’m listening. 6. This is your responsibility. 7. You have what it takes to succeed. – Sherrie Campbell PHD

Don’t raise your kids to have more than you had, raise them to be more than you were. – Unknown

It is ironic that adults want children to control their own behavior when the adults have difficulty controlling their own behavior. – Jane Nelsen

The way kids learn to make good decisions is by making decisions, not following directions. – Alfie Kohn

Children must never work for our love, they must rest in it. – Gordon Neufeld

When a child can’t calm down they need connection and comfort, not criticism and control. – Jane Evans

Instead of buying your children all the things you never had, you should teach them all the things you were never taught. Material wears out but knowledge stays. – Bruce Lee

Some of the most kind and thoughtful kids I know are raised in houses that are a mess, by parents who forget practices and wear mismatched socks. At times, I think this is may not be a coincidence. When parenting life becomes overwhelming, perhaps they knew what to let go and what to put first. Kindness matters. Socks…not so much. – Amy Pieper Webb

If you’ve told a child a thousand times and he still does not understand, then it is not the child who is the slow learner. – Walter Barbe

The more risks you allow your children to make, the better they learn to look after themselves. – Roald Dahl

Don’t tell your kids, “I’m proud of you,” tell them, “You should be proud of yourself.” – Kristen Welch

“Never do anything for a child that the child can do for himself.” This does not mean that you can never do anything for your child. It does mean that children are shortchanged when they don’t learn how capable they can be when they aren’t pampered.” – Jane Nelsen responding to Rudolf Dreikurs

Don’t let yourself become so concerned with raising a good kid that you forget you already have one. – Glennon Melton

Teach your children they’re unique. That way, they won’t feel pressured to be like everybody else. – Cindy Cashman

Being hard on children does not make them stronger. People are strengthened through compassion and understanding. No matter their age or gender. – Lella Schott

Treat a child as though he already is the person he’s capable of becoming. – Haim G. Ginott

It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken adults. – Frederick Douglass

One day your child will make a mistake or a bad choice and run to you instead of away from you. In that moment, you will know the immense value of picking and choosing your battles with your teen. – L.R. Knost

Empathy with children during a tantrum is not rewarding behavior. It’s meeting a need, the need for connection and understanding. – Rebecca Eanes

At the end of the day, the most overwhelming key to a child’s success is the positive involvement of parents. – Jane D. Hull

Having children is my greatest achievement. It was my savior. It switched my focus from the outside to the inside. My children are gifts, they remind me of what’s important. – Elle Macpherson

Too much love never spoils children. Children become spoiled when we substitute presents for presence. – Dr. Anthony Withman

Perfect parents exist but they do not yet have kids. – Unknown

Be the calm you want to see in your child. – Renee Jain

See related:

12 of the Best Growth Mindset Quotes for Kids

59 Funny Parenting Quotes That Will Make You Laugh Out Loud

70 of the Most Popular Parenting Quotes That Really Sum Up What Parenting is Like

Want to Raise a Self-Sufficient Kid? Using This Parenting Method is Essential

What Kids REALLY Need to be Confident, Independent, and Self-Reliant

What to do next…

1. subscribe to self-sufficient kids’ email list., 2. take one of my quizzes.

Find out if you’re raising a self-sufficient kid ( click here ) or if you’re doing too much for your kids ( click here ). At the end of each quiz, you’ll be asked to provide your email address to see the results.

3. Get your kids started on chores.

Learn how to get your child started on chores (& keep them motivated + avoid power struggles) by enrolling in my Get Your Kids Successfully Started on Chores course. Click here to learn more and sign up.

About Kerry Flatley

Hi! I’m Kerry, the mother of two girls and a certified parent educator. I believe it is possible for parents to have a supportive, loving, and warm relationship with their kids while raising them to be independent and ultimately self-sufficient. Over the years, I’ve read numerous books and articles that support this belief and I’ve put these ideas into practice with my own kids. Read more about me and Self-Sufficient Kids here.

50 Inspiring Parenting Quotes That Get You Through Hard Times

Raising a child is one of life’s most challenging and important tasks. 

As exhausting and challenging as parenthood can be, it is also one of the most rewarding and fulfilling roles.

Here are some quotes about parenting to help you through the challenges of parenthood and remember the joys.

Table of Contents

Parenting Quotes For Hard Times

“My heroes are and were my parents. I can’t see having anyone else as my heroes.” Michael Jordan

“We are apt to forget that children watch examples better than they listen to preaching”. Roy L. Smith

“Parents, deliberately or unaware, teach their children from birth how to behave, drink, feel and perceive. Liberation from these influences is no easy matter.” Eric Berne

“In any given moment we have two options: To step forward into growth or to step back into safety.” Abraham Maslow

“It’s not only children who grow. Parents do too. As much as we watch to see what our children do with their lives, they are watching us to see what we do with ours. I can’t tell my children to reach for the sun. All I can do is reach for it, myself.” Joyce Maynard

“We’re all imperfect parents, and that’s perfectly okay. Tiny humans need connection, not perfection.” LR Knost

“Parenting shouldn’t feel like a competitive sport. It’s plenty challenging without any added obstacles. Strive to be loving and kind; have the courage to ask for help; take a break when you need it; celebrate all the great stuff; be kind to yourself, and be yourself. That’s who your kid loves anyways.” Ariadne Brill

 “The point of parenting is not to have all the answers before we start out but instead to figure it out on the go as our children grow. Because as they do, so will we.” Bridgett Miller

“It takes a village to raise a child. Don’t be afraid to ask for help.”

“I may not be able to give my kids everything they want, but I give them what they need: love, time, and attention. You can’t buy those things.” Nishan Panwar

“The truth is, parenting as well as we can is always hard – really, truly, the hardest thing any of us has ever done.” Laura Markham

“If you’re completely exhausted and don’t know how you’re going to keep giving this much of yourself day after day, you’re probably a good parent.” Bunmi Laditan

“Motherhood has taught me the meaning of living in the moment and being at peace. Children don’t think about yesterday, and they don’t think about tomorrow. They just exist in the moment.” Jessalyn Gilsig

“If there is anything that we wish to change in the child, we should first examine it and see whether it is not something that could better be changed in ourselves.” Carl Jung

“No one is ever quite ready; everyone is always caught off guard. Parenthood chooses you. And you open your eyes, look at what you’ve got, say “Oh, my gosh,” and recognize that of all the balls there ever were, this is the one you should not drop. It’s not a question of choice.” Marisa de Los Santos

“Hugs can do great amounts of good – especially for children.” Princess Diana

“Children start out loving their parents, but as they grow older and discover their parents are human, they become judgmental. And sometimes, when they mature, they forgive their parents, especially when they discover they are also human.” Oscar Wilde

“Speak with your children as if they are the wisest, kindest, most beautiful humans on earth, for what they believe is what they will become.” Brooke Hampton

“Parenting is a lifetime job and does not stop when a child grows up. Jake Slope

”To be in your children’s memories tomorrow, you have to be in their lives today.” Barbara Johnson

“There is no such thing as a perfect parent. So just be the best one you can be.”

“Parenting is the easiest thing in the world to have an opinion about, but the hardest thing in the world to do.” Matt Walsh

“We never know the love of a parent till we become parents ourselves.” Henry Ward Beecher

“There is no way to be a perfect parent and a million ways to be a good one.” Jill Churchill

“No parent is always conscious, gentle, positive, peaceful, and authentic. We have to choose to be and practice moment by moment, day after day. The more we practice, the stronger we grow.” Lelia Schott

 “Making the decision to have a child — it’s momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body.” Elizabeth Stone

“Love doesn’t have goals or benchmarks or blueprints, but it does have a purpose. The purpose is not to change the people we love, but to give them what they need to thrive. Love’s purpose is not to shape our beloved’s destiny, but to help them shape their own. It isn’t to show them the way, but to help them find a path for themselves, even if the path they take isn’t one we would choose ourselves, or even one we would choose for them. The” Alison Gopnik

”Cleaning your house while your kids are still growing is like shoveling the walk before it stops snowing.” Phyllis Diller

“Your kids require you most of all to love them for who they are, not to spend your whole time trying to correct them.” Bill Ayers

“Motherhood is a constant learning process that requires flexibility and a sense of humor. And just when you think you have it all figured out, your children like to remind you that you certainly don’t.” Stacey A. Shannon

“Children are not a distraction from more important work. They are the most important work.” C.S. Lewis

“Having a child is like getting a tattoo … on your face. You better be committed.” Elizabeth Gilber

My children aren’t a burden or annoyance; they are my greatest masterpiece.”  Stacey A. Shannon

“The Golden Rule of Parenting is do unto your children as you wish your parents had done unto you!” Louise Hart

“No matter how far we come, our parents are always in us.” Brad Meltzer

”Enjoy the little things, for one day you may look back and realize they were the big things.” Robert Brault

“You will never really know what kind of parent you were or if you did it right or wrong. Never. And you will worry about this and them as long as you live. But when your children have children, and you watch them do what they do, you will have part of an answer.”  Robert Fulghum

Also See: 10 Keys To A Happy Childhood

Parenting Quotes For Raising Great Kids

“The goal of education is not to increase the amount of knowledge but to create the possibilities for a child to invent and discover.” Jean Piaget

“Play is the answer to the question, ‘How does anything new come about? “ Jean Piaget

“If you follow the child… you can find out something new.” Jean Piaget

“If parents want to give their children a gift, the best thing they can do is to teach their children to love challenges, be intrigued by mistakes, enjoy effort, and keep on learning. That way, their children don’t have to be slaves of praise. They will have a lifelong way to build and repair their own confidence.” Carol S. Dweck

“Allow children to be happy in their own way, for what better way will they find?” Samuel Johnson

“I think it’s necessary to let kids get bored once in a while – that’s how they learn to be creative.” Kim Raver

“Too much love never spoils children. Children become spoiled when we substitute presents for presence.” Anthony Withman

“It is time for parents to teach young people early on that in diversity, there is beauty, and there is strength.” Maya Angelou

“At the end of the day, the most overwhelming key to a child’s success is the positive involvement of parents.”  Jane D. Hull

“Having a parent who listens creates a child who believes he or she has a voice that matters in this world.” Rachel Macy Stafford

“The way we talk to our children becomes their inner voice.” Peggy O’Mara

“Affirming words from moms and dads are like light switches. Speak a word of affirmation at the right moment in a child’s life and it’s like lighting up a whole roomful of possibilities.” Gary Smalley

“So our job as parents is not to make a particular kind of child. Instead, our job is to provide a protected space of love, safety, and stability in which children of many unpredictable kinds can flourish. Our job is not to shape our children’s minds; it’s to let those minds explore all the possibilities that the world allows. Our job is not to tell children how to play; it’s to give them the toys and pick the toys up again after the kids are done. We can’t make children learn, but we can let them learn.” Alison Gopnik

Also See: Top 10 Good Parenting Tips

References For Inspiring Parenting Quotes

• 1. Maslow AH. Defense and growth. Toward a psychology of being .:42-56. doi:https://doi.org/10.1037/10793-004
• 2. Markham L. Peaceful Parent, Happy Siblings: How to Stop the Fighting and Raise Friends for Life . Penguin; 2015.
• 3. Progoff I. Jung’s Psychology and Its Social Meaning . Routledge; 2013. doi:https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315009131
• 4. Gopnik A. The Gardener and the Carpenter: What the New Science of Child Development Tells Us about the Relationship between Parents and Children . Macmillan; 2016.
• 5. Duckworth E. Piaget rediscovered. AT . Published online November 1964:496-499. doi:https://doi.org/10.5951/at.11.7.0496
• 6. Ray R. Redefining Education with Growth Mindset and Mastery Learning. IJSR . Published online April 5, 2020:789-792. doi:https://doi.org/10.21275/sr20410204106

Disclaimer: The content of this article is intended for informational purposes only and should not be considered medical advice. Always consult your healthcare provider for medical concerns.

30 Quotes on Parenting

Learn what these well-known people had to say about parenting..

Posted September 25, 2012

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Parents can only give good advice or put them on the right paths, but the final forming of a person's character lies in their own hands. - Anne Frank

Trust yourself. You know more than you think you do. - Benjamin Spock

We may not be able to prepare the future for our children, but we can at least prepare our children for the future. - President Franklin D. Roosevelt

Your kids require you most of all to love them for who they are, not to spend your whole time trying to correct them. - Bill Ayers

The best way to keep children at home is to make the home atmosphere pleasant, and let the air out of the tires. - Dorothy Parker

That's the nature of being a parent, Sabine has discovered. You'll love your children far more than you ever loved your parents, and - in the recognition that your own children cannot fathom the depth of your love - you come to understand the tragic, unrequited love of your own parents. - Ursula Hegi, Stones from the River

Most things are good, and they are the strongest things; but there are evil things too, and you are not doing a child a favor by trying to shield him from reality. The important thing is to teach a child that good can always triumph over evil. - Walt Disney

Having children is like living in a frat house - nobody sleeps, everything's broken, and there's a lot of throwing up. - Ray Romano

No matter how calmly you try to referee, parenting will eventually produce bizarre behavior, and I'm not talking about the kids. Their behavior is always normal. - Bill Cosby

There really are places in the heart you don't even know exist until you love a child. - Anne Lamott, Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son's First Year

Children have never been very good at listening to their elders, but they have never failed to imitate them. - James Baldwin

If you raise your children to feel that they can accomplish any goal or task they decide upon, you will have succeeded as a parent and you will have given your children the greatest of all blessings. - Brian Tracy

Your children are not your children, they come through you, but they are life itself, wanting to express itself. - Wayne Dyer

Everybody knows how to raise children, except the people who have them. - P.J. O'Rourke

You can learn many things from children. How much patience you have, for instance. - Franklin P. Adams

I want my children to have all the things I couldn’t afford. Then I want to move in with them. - Phyllis Diller

Before I got married I had six theories about raising children; now, I have six children and no theories. - John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester (1647-1680)

One thing I had learned from watching chimpanzees with their infants is that having a child should be fun. - Jane Goodall

Leave your pride, ego, and narcissism somewhere else. Reactions from those parts of you will reinforce your children's most primitive fears. - Henry Cloud

If you can control your behavior when everything around you is out of control, you can model for your children a valuable lesson in patience and understanding...and snatch an opportunity to shape character. - Jane Clayson Johnson, I Am a Mother

Educate your children to self-control , to the habit of holding passion and prejudice and evil tendencies subject to an upright and reasoning will, and you have done much to abolish misery from their future and crimes from society. - Benjamin Franklin

Perhaps it takes courage to raise children. - John Steinbeck, East of Eden

If you are a parent, open doors to unknown directions to the child so he can explore. Don't make him afraid of the unknown,give him support. - Osho

All of us have moments in out lives that test our courage. Taking children into a house with a white carpet is one of them. - Erma Bombeck

We spend the first 12 months of our children's lives teaching them to walk and talk and the next 12 months teaching them to sit down and shut up. - Phyllis Diller

Everything depends on upbringing. - Leo Tolstoy, War and Peace

The value of marriage is not that adults produce children, but that children produce adults. - Peter De Vries

We never know the love of the parent till we become parents ourselves. - Henry Ward Beecher

To bring up a child in the way he should go - travel that way yourself. - Josh Billings

Life so that when your children think of fairness and integrity, they think of you. - H. Jackson Brown, Jr.

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100 Positive Parenting Quotes About Raising Children

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Inside you’ll find a huge list of positive parenting quotes that will inspire you to be the best parent for your children that you can be.

Whether you’re raising a toddler or a teen — or any age in between — parenting is can be a challenge.

You question yourself constantly, wondering if you’re making the right choices.

Kids don’t come with instructions. So how are you supposed to know what you’re doing?

Here’s a little secret — you don’t. 

Very few of us do…

The majority of us are just winging it and doing the best we can.

And at the end of the day we all just want to raise a good kid, who is kind, strong and resilient.

But how exactly do we do that?

The good thing is that we can turn to friends, family, and experts when we need input on a particular topic.

Of course, we should always trust our own instincts, first and foremost. But, it doesn’t hurt to gather wisdom or a fresh perspective when needed.

One thing we know for sure — positive parenting works. That might look different for different families, but as a general rule of thumb, when people feel better they do better.

The way you talk to your kids eventually becomes their inner voice. 

Choosing to discipline with the goal of teaching your kids to do better, rather than punishing them for their mistakes, is one way you can practice positive parenting in your home. 

Really, the biggest thing is to lead by example. Talk to them the way you want them to talk to you and others. Model what it looks like to say sorry when you mess up. When in doubt, choose grace.

If you need a little encouragement on your positive parenting journey, look no further. 

Today we are sharing the best positive parenting quotes that will inspire and encourage you to become a more patient and impactful parent.

Inspiring Positive Parenting Quotes You’ll Love

1. “Your words as a parent have great power. Use them wisely and make sure they come from the heart.” — Carolina King

2. “To be in your children’s memories tomorrow, you have to be in their lives today.” — Barbara Johnson

3. “Your children make it impossible to regret your past. They’re its finest fruits. Sometimes the only ones.” — Anna Quindlen

4. “If you want your children to keep their feet on the ground, put some responsibility on their shoulders.” — Abigail Van Buren

5. “Speak to your children as if they are the wisest, kindest, most beautiful and magical humans on earth, for what they believe is what they will become.” — Brooke Hampton

6. “We’re all imperfect parents and that’s perfectly okay. Tiny humans need connection not perfection.” —L. R. Knost

7. “Where did we ever get the crazy idea that in order to make children do better, first we have to make them feel worse? Think of the last time you felt humiliated or treated unfairly. Did you feel like cooperating or doing better?” — Jane Nelson

8. “The most powerful way to change the world is to live in front of our children the way we would like the world to be.” — Graham White

9. “Children must be taught how to think, not what to think.” — Margaret Mead

10. “By loving them for more than their abilities, we show our children that they are much more than the sum of their accomplishments.” — Eileen Kennedy-Moore

11. “Too much love never spoils our children. Children become spoiled when we substitute presents for presence.” — Anthony Withman

12. “If you can control your behavior when everything around you is out of control, you can model for your children a valuable lesson in patience and understanding….and snap an opportunity to shape up character.” — Jane Clayson Johnson

13. “Adults who are respectful of children are not just modeling a skill or behavior, they are meeting the emotional needs of those children, thereby helping to create the psychological conditions for children to treat others respectfully.” — Alfie Kohn

14. “So often, children are punished for being human. They are not allowed to have grumpy moods, bad days, disrespectful tones, or bad attitudes. Yet, we adults have them all the time. None of us are perfect. We must stop holding our children to a higher standard of perfection than we can attain ourselves.” — Rebecca Eanes 

15. “Raise your words, not your voice. It is rain that grows flowers, not thunder.” — Rumi

16. “No matter the problem, kindness is always the right response.” — L.R. Knost

17. “It is the nature of the child to be dependent, and it is the nature of dependence to be outgrown. Begrudging dependency because it is not independence is like begrudging winter because it is not spring. Dependency blossoms into independence in its own time.” — Peggy O’Mara

18. “Every day in a hundred small ways our children ask us, ‘Do you see me? Do you hear me? Do I matter?’ This behavior often reflects our response.” — L.R. Knost

 19. “Trust children. Nothing could be more simple, or more difficult. Difficult because to trust children we must learn to trust ourselves, and most of us were taught as children that we should not be trusted.” — John Holt

Related: How to Raise a Grateful Child [12 Practical Parenting Tips]

20. “Release your attachment to how things ‘ought’ to be and instead to surrender to how they actually are.” — Dr. Shefali Tsabary

21. “The world is changed by examples, not by opinions.” — Paulo Coehlo

22. “Pushing children into something when they’re not ready only pushes them away. Let them know that waiting and observing is an option. Doing something when they are comfortable and ready is perfectly acceptable. It develops self-awareness and self-respect.” — Kristy Lee

23. “Don’t tell your kids, ‘I’m proud of you.’ Tell them, ‘You should be proud of yourself.’” — Kristen Welch

24. “To love someone is to strive to accept that person exactly the way he or she is.” — Fred Rogers

25. “I wish children could grow according to their natural pace: sleep when sleepy, wake up when rested, eat when hungry, cry when upset, play and explore without being unnecessarily interrupted. In other words, be allowed to grow and blossom as each was meant to.” — Magda Gerber

26. “Nothing that grieves us can be called little. By the eternal law of proportions, a child’s loss of a doll and a king’s loss of his crown are events of the same size.” — Mark Twain

27. “Never fear spoiling children by making them too happy. Happiness is the atmosphere in which all good affections grow.” — Thomas Bray

28. “A child seldom needs a good talking to as much as a good listening to.” — Robert Brault

29. “Behind every young child who believes in himself is a parent who believed first.” — Matthew L. Jacobson

30. “Feeling heard and understood allows children to release the feelings, let go, and move on.” — Janet Lansbury

31. “You must first teach a child he is loved. Only then is he ready to learn everything else.” — Amanda Morgan

32. “Counteract conflict by connection and communicating calmly.” — Kristy Lee

33. “Being a mom means choosing to show up day after day and love day after day and give day after day and try day after day and not having all the answers and not being perfect but simply doing your best.” — Rachel Martin

34. “Children, after all, are not just adults-in-the-making. They are people whose current needs and rights and experiences must be taken seriously.” — Alfie Kohn

35. “Peaceful parenting is simply treating our tiny humans with the same humanity that we like to be treated with ourselves.” — L.R. Knost

36. “Every day our children spread their dreams beneath our feet. We should tread softly.” — Sir Ken Robinson

37. “It’s not only children who grow. Parents do too. As much as we watch to see what our children do with their lives, they are watching us to see what we do with ours. I can’t tell my children to reach for the sun. All I can do is reach for it myself.” — Joyce Maynard

38. “I’m always amazed when adults say that children ‘just did that to get attention’. Naturally children who need attention will do all kinds of things to get it. Why not just give it to them?” — Lawrence J. Cohen

39. “If a child can’t learn the way we teach, maybe we should teach the way they learn.” — Ignacio Estrada

40. “Children do not need us to shape them; they need us to respond to who they are.” — Naomi Aldort

Related: Enjoying Motherhood [How to Love Being a Mom When it’s Hard]

41. “Children do well if they can. If they can’t, we need to figure out why so we can help.” — Ross Greene

42. It’s time we stop buying the lie that we need to be hard on kids because ‘the world is hard’. Love them as hard as you can. That’s what they need.” — Tara Vogler

43. “Listen earnestly to anything your children want to tell you, no matter what. If you don’t listen eagerly to the little stuff when they are little, they won’t tell you the big stuff when they are big, because to them all of it has always been big stuff.” — Catherine M. Wallace

44. “There are times as a parent when you realize that your job is not to be the parent you always imagined you’d be, the parent you always wished you had. Your job is to be the parent your child needs, given the particulars of his or her own life and nature.” — Ayelet Waldman

45. “Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet.” — Jean-Jacques Rousseau

46. “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” — Maya Angelou

47. “Motherhood has taught me the meaning of living in the moment and being at peace. Children don’t think about yesterday, and they don’t think about tomorrow. They just exist in the moment.” — Jessalyn Gilsig

48. “Every father should remember that one day his son will follow his example instead of his advice.” — Charles F. Kettering

49. “Being a mother is not about what you gave up to have a child, but what you’ve gained from having one.” — Jill Churchill

50. “By making eye contact, getting down to your child’s level, offering a touch, or using a tone of your voice that conveys a desire to genuinely connect, you disarm yourself. You make it possible to reach your child more deeply and truly move forward together.” — Hilary Flowers

51. “Kids raised from birth on to feel safe expressing their emotions, who feel their parents are on their side, aren’t perfect. They’re easier to parent, though, because they’re better at managing their emotions, and therefore their behavior. They’re more willing to accept our guidance.” — Laura Markham

52. “We all need someone who understands.” — Magda Gerber

53. “There’s no way to be a perfect mother and a million ways to be a good one.” — Jill Churchill

54. “At the end of the day, the most overwhelming key to a child’s success is the positive involvement of parents.” — Jane D. Hull

55. “Kids don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.” — Riney Jordan

56. “Nurturing never happens in a rush.” — Emma Scheib

57. “Children should not be burdened with making us happy, nor blamed for making us sad or angry.  Children are not responsible for how we feel.  We are.” — Larissa Dan

58. “The best security blanket a child can have is parents who respect each other.” — Janet Blaustone

59. “A lot of parents will do anything for their kids except let them be themselves.” — Banksy

60. “There is no single effort more radical in its potential for saving the world than a transformation of the way we raise our children.” — Marianne Williamson

Related: 101 Powerful Affirmations for Kids to Build Confidence and Self-Control

61. “If you want your children to turn out well, spend twice as much time with them, and half as much money.” — Abigail Van Buren

62. “You’re always going to wonder if you’re doing things wrong. But that’s what it means to be a mom, to care so much about someone else that you just want to be as perfect as possible.” — Naya Rivera

63. “A good father is one of the most unsung, unpraised, unnoticed, and yet one of the most valuable assets in our society.” — Billy Graham

64. “Play is the language of childhood.  Speaking our children’s language may sound like nonsense to us, but it sounds like love to them.” — L.R. Knost

65. “How do we communicate worthiness to our children? Only through our presence. Our full-on, engaged, attuned presence.” — Dr. Shefali Tsabary

66. “I wholeheartedly believe that when we are fully engaged in parenting regardless of how imperfect, vulnerable, and messy it is, we are creating something sacred.” — Brene Brown

67. “Each day of our lives we make deposits into the memory banks of our children.” — Charles R. Swindoll

68. “Most things are good, and they are the strongest things; but there are evil things too, and you are not doing a child a favor by trying to shield him from reality. The important thing is to teach a child that good can always triumph over evil.” — Walt Disney

69. “I looked on child-rearing not only as a work of love and duty, but as a profession that was fully interesting and challenging as any honorable profession in the world and one that demanded the best that I could bring to it.” — Rose Kennedy

70. “One day, your child will make a mistake or a bad choice and run to you instead of away form you and in that moment you will know the immense value of peaceful, positive, respectful parenting.” — L.R. Knost

71. “Childhood is fleeting, so let kids be kids and cherish the time you have together.” — Abraham Lincoln

72. “Train up a child in the way he should go – but be sure you go that way yourself.” — Charles Spurgeon

73. “I realized when you look at your mother, you are looking at the purest love you will ever know.” — Mitch Albom

74. “Provide plenty of love balanced by structure and discipline.” — Barack Obama

75. “Children learn more from what you are than what you teach.” — W.E.B. DuBois

76. “The greatest happiness is family happiness.” — Joyce Brothers

77. “Remember that the most important thing is not your child’s behavior. The most important thing is your child. Look beyond behavior and connect with your child.” — Issa Waters

78. “The golden rule of parenting is to always show your children the kind of person you want them to be.” — Elizabeth Roxas

79. “I have found the very best way to advise your children is to find out what they want to do and advise them to do it.” — Harry S. Truman

80. “Parenting shifts as your kid shifts. The best thing for me has been throwing any kind of parenting manual out the window.” — Kate Hudson

Related: How to be a Happy Mom; 13 Real-Life Strategies that Work

81. “At the end of your life, you will never regret not having passed one more test, not winning one more verdict or not closing one more deal. You will regret time not spent with a husband, a friend, a child, or a parent.” — Barbara Bush

82. “I think it’s necessary to let kids be bored once in a while. That’s how they learn to be creative.” — Kim Raver

83. “They say that parenting is like dancing. You take one step, your child takes another.” — Michael Jackson

84. “No matter how busy you are, carve out time to play with your kids.” — Theodore Roosevelt

85. “Children are educated by what the grown-up is and not by his talk.” — Carl Jung

86. “Parents can only give good advice or put them on the right paths, but the final forming of a person’s character lies in their own hands.” — Anne Frank

87. “The best way to make children good is to make them happy.” — Oscar Wilde

88. “When a man dies, if he can pass enthusiasm along to his children, he has left them an estate of incalculable value.” — Thomas Edison

89. “It is time for parents to teach young people that in diversity there is beauty and there is strength.” — Maya Angelou

90. “Your kids require you most of all to love them for who they are, not spend your whole time trying to correct them.” — Bill Ayers

91. “I think a lot about teaching my kids to work hard. I’ve learned something about kids — they don’t do what you say; they do what you do.” — Jennifer Lopez

92. “The best kind of parent you can be is to lead by example.” — Drew Barrymore

93. “When someone else’s happiness is your happiness, that is love.” — Lana Del Rey

94. “Be the person you want your child to be.” — Betsy Brown

95. “Children have never been very good at listening to their elders, but have never failed to imitate them.” — James Baldwin

96. “Every home is a university and the parents are the teachers.” — Mahatma Gandhi

97. “Never help a child with a task at which he feels he can succeed.” — Maria Montessori

98. “Parents are not perfect, nor are they saints. Dads and moms make mistakes all the time. How you handle these situations will be an important life lesson for your children.” — Bethany Bridges

99. “At the end of the day, my most important job is still mom-in-chief.” — Michelle Obama

100. “To the world you may be one person, but to one person you may be the world.” — Dr. Seuss

More Inspirational Parenting Quotes:

• 30 Gentle Parenting Quotes for Encouragement and Inspiration
• 50 Inspirational Parenting Quotes You Need to Hear
• 50+ Bonding Mother-Daughter Quotes On Unconditional Love
• 40+ Best Mama Quotes for Those Challenging Days

Conclusion:

There is no such thing as a perfect parent, but we can all commit to small improvements every day.

As we become more calm and patient with our children, they will do the same with us. This will have a huge impact on your family dynamic over the years and will result in the creation of a strong bond with your children that will stand the test of time.

Hi! I’m Lauren Tingley M.Ed. and Certified Family Life Expert who empowers overwhelmed families to thrive in their modern lives. As a veteran educator and mother, I understand the pressures and challenges of juggling careers, raising children, and having fun as a family. As an experienced home cook and parenting expert, I love sharing ideas for family-friendly meals, kid-friendly activities, and simplifying family life. My advice and ideas have been featured in major publications like Parents Magazine , Good Housekeeping , and Care.com . I’m passionate about connecting with mothers and inspiring them to create a simpler, more balanced life. Click here to learn more about my background, experience, and philosophies.

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The Ultimate List of 115+ Inspirational Parenting Quotes (Printable Included)

Sharing is caring!

Obviously, people love quotes because you see quotes EVERYWHERE  printed on EVERYTHING these days. I too love quotes, but there are so many quotes it can become overwhelming to sift through them for the best. This inspired me to compile a list of the very best parenting quotes.

There are so many different parenting quotes. I decided to divide the post into different types of favorite parenting quotes.

Family Quotes

Positive parenting quotes, intentional parenting quotes, popular parenting quotes, funny parenting quotes, parenting quotes for moms.

• Parenting Quotes For Fatherhood
• L.R Knost Parenting Quotes
• Dr. Shefali Tsabary Parenting Quotes

Parenting Quotes By Famous People

• Parenting Quotes By U.S. Presidents Or Their Wives

Parenting Quotes For New Parents

Parenting quotes on how to talk to children, christian parenting quotes.

Quotes can be beneficial in many ways.  They are pieces of wisdom condensed into one or a few sentences, which can resonate with the heart of the reader.  Parenting quotes  have the power to bring hope, faith, inspiration, and motivation to the parents reading them.  Many parenting quotes contain great advice. Therefore, they make awesome learning tools.

Quotes are best used when they are read several times.  If the quote influences you in a positive manner, you can write it down or print it out.  Place the parenting quote in an area where you will see it often.  You can even  print it out and create a T-Shirt  to spread your favorite quotes. Repeating quotes is a way to use them to your family’s advantage, learn from them and make them a part of who you are as a parent.

This post has affiliate links to help keep this blog running and I may earn a small commission at no cost to you.

Families are like branches on a tree.  We grow in different directions, yet our roots remain as one.  ~Unknown

The world, we’d discovered, doesn’t love you like your family loves you. ~Louis Zamperini

In family life, love is the oil that eases friction, the cement that binds closer together, and the music that brings harmony. ~Friedrich Nietzsche

Being a family means you are a parent of something very wonderful. It means you will love and beloved for the rest of your life. ~Lisa Weed

The only rock I know that stays steady, the only institution I know that works, is the family ~Lee Iacocca

A dysfunctional family is any family with more than one person in it. ~Mary Karr

What can you do to promote world peace? Go home and love your family? ~Mother Teresa

Home is where you are loved the most and act the worst. ~Marjorie Pay Hinckley

Any child in his right mind will test the limits.  That’s his job.  He’s pretty new on the planet, after all, and he’s figuring out the rules.  The most common reason that children test the limits is that they really want to find out where those limits are.  Children need the security of knowing that someone more experienced and knowledgeable is looking out for them.  They don’t feel safe when we don’t guide and nurture.  That’s why we often say that children will keep pushing until they find our limits.  ~ Dr. Laura Markham

So often, children are punished for being human. Children are not allowed to have grumpy moods, bad days, disrespectful tones, or bad attitudes, yet we adults have them all the time.  None of us are perfect, and we must stop holding our children to a higher standard of perfection than we can attain ourselves.  ~Rebecca Eanes

Yes, I Want The Ultimate List of Inspirational Parenting Quotes Printable PDF!

You can’t teach children to behave better by making them feel worse.  When children feel better they behave better. ~Pam Lee

The sign of great parenting is not the child’s behavior.  The sign of truly great parenting is the parent’s behavior.   ~Unknown

Remember, loving guidance is about helping children to be more likely to choose to be cooperative. It is about choice, not force. ~Becky A. Bailey

Children are our equals, not in skill or knowledge, but in human dignity. ~Jennifer Lehr

Parents are often quick to judge whether or not behavior warrants a punishment, but when we pause to listen to what the behavior is saying about our child’s feelings and experience, a whole new world opens up to us and our children.  ~Rebecca Eanes

The example we set for our kids – how to act when things don’t go our way- is much, much more important than the rules we set for them. ~Leo Babauta

Kids don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.  ~Riney Jordan

Don’t let yourself become so concerned with raising a good kid that you forget you already have one. ~Glennon Melton

Sticks and stones may break bones, but words can shatter souls. Words matter. Choose wisely. ~L.R. Knost

Children should not be burdened with making us happy, nor blamed for making us sad or angry.  Children are not responsible for how we feel.  We are. ~Larissa Dann

You will never look back on life and think, “I spent too much time with my kids.”  ~Unknown

Nurturing never happens in a rush.  ~Emma Scheib

There are two gifts we should give our children.  One is roots.  The other is wings.  ~Unknown

Never fear spoiling children by making them too happy. Happiness is the atmosphere in which all good affections grow.  ~Thomas Bray

Children will become what they are told they are.  ~Dorothy Delay

The best security blanket a child can have is parents who respect each other.  ~Janet Blaustone

In raising my children, I have lost my mind but found my soul.  ~Unknown

Every child needs at least one adult who is irrationally crazy about him or her. ~Uri Bronfenbrenner

Listen earnestly to anything your children want to tell you.  No matter what.  If you don’t listen eagerly to the little stuff when they are little, they won’t tell you the big stuff when they are big because to them all of it has always been big stuff.  ~Catherine M. Wallace

Stop trying to perfect your child, but keep trying to perfect your relationship with him. ~Dr. Henker

A lot of parents will do anything for their kids except let them be themselves.  ~Banksy

To raise a child who is comfortable enough to leave you means you’ve done your job.  They are not ours to keep but to teach how to soar on their own.  ~Unknown

The kids who need the most love will ask for it in the most unloving ways.  ~Unknown

There is no single effort more radical in its potential for saving the world than a transformation of the way we raise our children.  ~Marianne Williamson

The most important thing a father can do for his children is to love their mother, and the most important thing a mother can do for her children is to love their father.  ~Anonymous

If you want your children to turn out well, spend twice as much time with them, and half as much money. ~Abigail Van Buren

Don’t worry that children never listen to you; worry that they are always watching you.  ~Robert Fulghum

Be who you needed when you were young.  ~Unknown

The quickest way for a parent to get a child’s attention is to sit down and look comfortable. ~Lane Ollinghouse

If evolution works, how come mother’s only have two hands? ~David Frost

My kids will walk right past their fatehr sitting on the couch and come bang on the shower door for me to open a fruit snack. ~ The Funny Beaver

From what I can gather, motherhood is just repeatedly getting up after having just sat down two seconds ago. ~Lauren Mullen

You know you’ve grown a lot as a parent when you watch your kid lick something in public and think, “Eh. He’s licked worse.” ~@PerfectPending

Ok, kids, listen carefully because I’m only going to say this 175,276 more times. ~@mommyowl

The only things kids wear out faster than their shoes is their parents. ~John J. Plomp

As a mother, my job is to take care of the possible and trust God with the impossible.  ~Ruth Bell Graham

There is only one pretty child in the world, and every mother has it. ~Chinese Proverb

Motherhood has taught me the meaning of living in the moment and being at peace. Children don’t think about yesterday and they don’t think about tomorrow. They just exist in the moment. ~Jesalyn Gilsig

God could not be everywhere so he created mothers. ~Jewish Proverb

You’re always going to wonder if you’re doing things wrong. But that’s what it means to be a mom, to care so much about someone else that you just want to be as perfect as possible. ~Naya Rivera

There’s no way to be a perfect mother and a million ways to be a good one. ~Jill Churchhill

We have a secret in our culture, and it’s not that birth is painful. It’s that women are strong. ~Laura Stavoe Harm

I realized when you look at your mother, you are looking at the purest love you will ever know. ~Mitch Albom

Parenting Quotes About Fatherhood

To her, the name of fatehr was another name for love. ~Fanny Fern

My father didn’t tell me how to live. He lived and let me watch him do it. ~Clarence Budinton Kelland

One of the greatest things a father can do for his children is to love their mother. ~Howard W. Hunter

Every father should remember one day his son will follow his example, not his advice. ~Charles Kettering

My father used to play with my brother and me in the yard. Mother would come out and say, “You’re tearing up the grass.” “We’re not raising grass,” Dad would reply, “We’re raising boys!” ~Harmon Killebrew

A good father is one of the most unsung, unpraised, unnoticed, and yet one of the most valuable assets in our society. ~Billy Graham

When I was a boy of 14, my father ws so ignorant I could hardly stand ot have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much he had learned in seven years. ~Mark Twain

L.R. Knost Parenting Quotes

Every day in a hundred small ways our children ask, ” Do you see me?  Do you hear me?  Do I matter?”  Their behavior often reflects our response. ~L.R. Knost

It’s not our job to toughen our children up to face a cruel and heartless world. It’s our job to raise children who will make hte world a little less cruel and heartless. L.R. Knost

Parenting has nothing to do with perfection. Perfection isn’t even the goal, not for us, not for our children. Learning together to live well in an imperfect world, loving each other despite or even because of our imperfections, and growing as humans while we grow our little humans, those are the goals of gentle parenting. So don’t ask yourself at the end of the day if you did everything right. Ask yourself what you learned and how well you loved, then grow from your answer. That is perfect parenting.  ~L.R. Knost

Respond to your children with love in the worst moments, their broken moments, their angry moments, their selfish moments, their lonely moments, their frustrating moments, their inconvenient moments because it is in their most  unlovable  human moments that they most need to  feel loved .  ~L.R. Knost

Play is the language of childhood.  Speaking our children’s language may sound like nonsense to us, but it sounds like love to them.  ~L.R. Knost

Discipline is helping a child solve a problem.  Punishment is making a child suffer for having a problem.  To raise problem solvers, focus on solutions, not retributions.  ~L.R. Knost

One day, your child will make a mistake or a bad choice and run to you instead of away form you and in that moment you will know the immense value of peaceful, positive, respectful parenting. ~L.R. Knost

Dr. Shefali Tsabary Quotes

When you parent, it’s crucial you realize you aren’t raising a “mini-me” but a spirit throbbing its own signature. ~Dr. Shefali Tsabary

In all kinds of ways- if we are willing, our children take us into places in our hearts we didn’t know existed. ~Dr. Shefali Tsabary

The parenting journey holds the potential to be a spiritually regenerative experience for both parent and child, where every moment is a meeting of spirits, and both parent and child appreciate that each dances on a spiritual path that’s unique, holding hands and yet alone. ~Dr. Shefali Tsabary

To shift the parenting paradigm so that it is no longer about the raising of the child, but the raising of the parent’s consciousness. ~Dr. Shefali Tsabary

How do we communicate worthiness to our children? Only through our presence. Our full-on, engaged, attuned presence. ~Dr. Shefali Tsabary

Once children enter our life, their impact is indelible and we are required to reinvent ourselves in response ~Dr. Shefali Tsabary

Parent the child in front of you and not the child you fantasized about having. ~Dr. Shefali Tsabary

I wholeheartedly believe that when we are fully engaged in parenting regardless of how imperfect, vulnerable, and messy it is, we are creating something sacred. ~Brene’ Brown

Your children need your  presence  more than your  presents .  ~Jesse Jackson

Each day of our lives we make deposits into the memory banks of our children.  ~Charles R. Swindoll

It’s not difficult to take care of a child; it’s difficult to do anything else while taking care of a child.  ~Julianne Moore

Sleep at this point is just a concept, something I’m looking forward to investigating in the future. ~Amy Poehler

A 2- year old is kind of like having a blender, but you don’t have a top for it. ~Jerry Seinfeld

I’ve never met a 2-year old who is terrible. I’m so cool with every stage my daughter goes through. I just think she’s amazing. I hope she’s not looking at me thinking, “Mom are the terrible 30s coming on with you?” ~Katie Holmes

It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men. ~Fredrick Douglass

Most things are good, and they are the strongest things; but there are evil things too, and you are not doing a child a favor by trying to shield him from reality. The important thing is to teach a child that good can always triumph over evil. ~Walt Disney

We need to remember to teach our children that solitude can be a much-to-be-desired condition. Not only is it acceptable to be alone; at times it is positively to be wished for…. In the silence we listen to ourselves. Then we ask questions of ourselves. We describe ourselves to ourselves, and in the quietude we may even hear the voice of God. ~Maya Angelou

Parenting Quotes From U.S Presidents Or Their Wives

I looked on child-rearing not only as a work of love and duty but as a profession that was fully interesting and challenging as any honorable profession in the world and one that demanded the best that I could bring to it. ~Rose Kennedy

My mother was the most beautiful woman I ever saw. All I am I owe to my mother. I attribute my success in life to the moral, intellectual, and physical education I received from her. ~George Washington

The bond between mothers and their children is one defined by love. As a mother’s prayers for her children are unending, so are the wisdom, grace, and strength they provide to their children.” ~George W. Bush

Childhood is fleeting, so let kids be kids and cherish the time you have together. ~Abraham Lincoln

No matter how busy you are, carve out time to play with your kids. ~Theodore Roosevelt

Provide plenty of love balanced by structure and discipline. ~Barack Obama

I have found the very best way to advise your children is to find out what they want to do and advise them to do it. ~Harry S. Truman

Children are apt to live up to what you believe of them. ~Lady Bird Johnson

At the end of your life, you will never regret not having passed one more test, not winning one more verdict or not closing one more deal. You will regret time not spent with a husband, a friend, a child, or a parent. ~Barbara Bush

A baby will make love stronger, days shorter, nights longer, bankroll smaller, home happier, clothes shabbier, the past forgotten and the future worth living for. ~Unknown

A baby fills a place in your heart that you never knew was empty. ~Unknown

Do what you feel in your heart to be right. You’ll be crtiicized either way. ~Eleanor Roosevelt

Having a baby dragged me, kicking and screaming from the world of self-absorption. ~Paul Reiser

What good mothers and fathers instinctively feel like doing for their babies is usually best after all. ~Benjamin Spock

Speak to your children as if they are the wisest, kindest, most beautiful and magical humans on earth.  For what they believe is what they will become.  ~Brooke Hampton

If you want your children to improve, let them overhear the nice things you say about them to others.  ~Haim Ginott

Parents need to fill a child’s bucket of self-esteem so high that the rest of the world can’t poke enough holes to drain it dry. ~Unknown

A child seldom needs a good talking to as a good listening to.  ~Robert Brault

Because children see parents as authority figures and gods, they think that the way you treat them is the way they deserve to be treated: “What you say about me is what I am” is a literal truth to our child. Consequently, when children are treated with respect, they conclude that they deserve respect and hence develop self-respect. ~Stephanie Marston

God hasn’t just sent you to do his work in the lives of your children; he will use the lives of your children to advance his work in you. ~ Paul David Tripp

Your greatest contribution to the Kingdom of God may not be SOMETHING YOU DO, but SOMEONE you raise!  ~Unknown

Our children are the greatest gift God will give to you, and their souls the heaviest responsibility He will place in your hands. Take time with them, teach them to have faith in God. Be a person in whom they can have faith. When you are old, nothing else you’ve done will have mattered as much.  ~Lisa Wingate

Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it. Proverbs 22:6

Train up a child in the way he should go – but be sure you go that way yourself. ~Charles Spurgeon

Affirming words from moms and dads are like light switches. Speak a word of affirmation at the right moment in a child’s life and it’s like lighting up a whole roomful of possibilities. ~Gary Smalley

Our job as a parent is to recognize, accept, and appreciate the unique way God has created each child. So tell your children and show them that you love and appreciate them just like God made them. When you do, it conveys incredible worth and value to them. ~Paul Osteen

Love your children—and let them know you love them. Children who experience love find it far easier to believe God loves them. ~Billy Graham

I believe that children are, by nature, very forgiving. I don’t think children expect their parents to be perfect. I think they demand that their parents be real. ~Beth Moore

Call to Action

Undoubtedly, there are tons of smart parenting quotes.  I encourage you to get  The Ultimate List of Inspirational Parenting Quotes PDF , print out this list and put it somewhere it will inspire you.  Furthermore, share it with other parents.  Be a light in their day by passing on these messages of inspiration and motivation.

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The way we talk to our children becomes their inner voice.  ~Peggy O’Mara

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210 Parents Quotes to Understand Their Love & Sacrifice

These parents quotes will warm your heart and make you appreciate your mom and dad more than before!

Each one of us has parents who brought us into this world. Without them, no one will take care of us and love us unconditionally. But sometimes, we take our mom and dad for granted because they are always by our side.

So, make today the day to show your love and appreciation to your parents. Our collection is full of wise and heartwarming quotes that perfectly describe every mother and father.

Read our entire collection below that will surely make you love them more!

Let’s get started.

And don’t forget to check out these mom quotes and family quotes .

Best Parents Quotes

1. “Parents act so strong for us that we often forget just how fragile they are.” – Miska Amani

2. “We never know the love of a parent ’till we become parents ourselves.” – Henry Ward Beecher

3. “Nobody on earth can ever love you more than your parents.” – Anonymous

4. “There is no friendship, no love like that of the parent for the child.” – Henry Ward Beecher 

5. “A parent’s love is whole no matter how many times divided.” – Robert Brault

6. “A father’s goodness is higher than the mountain. A mother’s goodness deeper than the sea.” – Japanese Proverb

7. “The best inheritance a parent can give his children is a few minutes of his time each day.” – Orlando Aloysius Battista

8. “Parental love is the only love that is truly selfless, unconditional, and forgiving.” – Dr. T.P. Chia

9. “It is the sunlight of parental love and encouragement that enables a child to grow in competence and slowly gain mastery over his environment.” – Felicity Bauer

10. “Appreciate your parents. You never know what sacrifices they went through for you.” – Anonymous

11. “Tell me something so beautiful that life seems worth living—parents’ love.” – Anonymous

12. “First, your parents, they give you your life, but then they try to give you their life.” – Chuck Palahniuk

13. “Parents were the only ones obligated to love you. From the rest of the world, you had to earn it.” – Ann Brashares

14. “If you don’t understand what unconditional love is, when you become a parent, it all makes sense.” – Kate Summers

15. “Always love your parents no matter what may be the situation because they love you always without even thinking of any situation, wholeheartedly.” – Anirudh Jhawar

Also read: Mother and Daughter Quotes

Inspirational Quotes About Parents

16. “What it’s like to be a parent, it’s one of the hardest things you’ll ever do, but in exchange, it teaches you the meaning of unconditional love.” – Nicholas Sparks

17. “Parents aren’t the people you come from. They’re the people you want to be when you grow up.” – Jodi Picoult

18. “Parents are living gods. They do everything to make their children happy and expect nothing in return.” – Saravanakumar Murugan

19. “Mistakes are made, and lessons are learned whether raising a son or a daughter or both, whether raising one child or more than one, or whether raising a child with your husband, as a single parent, or in a blended family. No parent is perfect.” – Catherine Garcia-Prats

20. “There is no such thing as being the perfect parent so just be a real one.” – Sue Atkins

21. “You learn so much about yourself from being a parent, and you care more about the world you are raising your kids in.” – Kim Kardashian

22. “My heroes were my parents. I can’t see having anyone else as my heroes.” – Michael Jordan

23. “Behind every young child who believes in himself is a parent who believed first.” – Matthew Jacobson

24. “I also believe that parents, if they love you, will hold you up safely above their swirling waters, and sometimes that means you’ll never know what they endured, and you may treat them unkindly in a way you otherwise wouldn’t.” – Mitch Albom

25. “The world talks to the mind. Parents speak more intimately. They talk to the heart.” – Haim Ginott

26. “Love can change a person the way a parent can change a baby—awkwardly, and often with a great deal of mess.” – Lemony Snicket

27. “At some point, you realize your parents are human. They make the best decisions they can with the options available to them.” – Anonymous

28. “You, the parent, are your child’s first teacher and his best teacher. It’s an awesome responsibility, but one that brings immeasurable rewards.” – Jacquie McTaggart

29. “Parents are the bones on which children cut their teeth.” – Peter Ustinov

30. “Let parents bequeath to their children not riches, but the spirit of reverence.” – Plato

Also read: Father and Daughter Quotes

Quotes About the Love Parents Have for Their Child

31. “The depth of the love of parents for their children cannot be measured. It is like no other relationship. It exceeds concern for life itself. The love of a parent for a child is continuous and transcends heartbreak and disappointment.” – James E. Faust

32. “Love is the chain whereby to bind a child to its parents.” – Abraham Lincoln

33. “The joys of parents are secret, and so are their grieves and fears. They cannot utter the one, nor will they utter the other.” – Francis Bacon

34. “They’re your parents. They’re meant to love you because. Never in spite.” – Patrick Ness

35. “The love between a parent and their children is always and forever.” – Anonymous

36. “Your kids require you most of all to love them for who they are, not to spend your whole time trying to correct them.” – Bill Ayers

37. “Only parents love you unconditionally. Everyone else carries a ‘Conditions Apply’ tag. This is the ultimate truth of life.” – Prathamesh Medhekar

38. “Your most important job as a parent, or as a friend to a child, is to mentor children in a field of unconditional love and acceptance.” – Tara Bianca

39. “For all that our parents do for us, there is no way of repaying them. Though they do not expect anything but love from us, an occasional thank you or an acknowledgment to appreciate them might just make them happy.” – Anonymous

40. “There really are places in the heart you don’t even know exist until you love a child.” – Anne Lamott

Also read: New Dad Quotes

Interesting Quotes That Zoom in on What It’s Like to Be a Parent

41. “Parents can only give good advice or put them on the right paths, but the final forming of a person’s character lies in their own hands.” – Anne Frank

42. “Parents are like God because you wanna know they’re out there, and you want them to think well of you, but you really only call when you need something.” – Chuck Palahniuk

43. “So much is asked of parents, and so little is given.” – Virginia Satir

44. “Good parents hardly parent. They let their kids learn, fail, and grow without interference.” – Trevor Carss

45. “It is time for parents to teach young people early on that in diversity there is beauty, and there is strength.” – Maya Angelou

46. “Our parents’ prayer is the most beautiful poetry and expectations.” – Aditya Rinaldi

47. “It would be easy to be a parent if you said ‘yes’ all the time and gave them what they wanted, but you just can’t do that. There are certain things, of course, where you’re going to say ‘no’ and be tougher on.” – Chrissy Teigen

48. “The most important thing that parents can teach their children is how to get along without them.” – Frank Clark

49. “The relation between parents and children is essentially based on teaching.” – Gilbert Highet

50. “Being a parent makes you feel like a blanket that’s always too small. No matter how hard you try to cover everyone, there’s always someone who’s freezing.” – Fredrik Backman

51. “My parents have lived longer than most and have expected very little. We have been blessed in too many ways to count.” – Ralph Webster

52. “So often, children are punished for being human. They are not allowed to have grumpy moods, bad days, disrespectful tones, or bad attitudes. Yet, we adults have them all the time. None of us are perfect. We must stop holding our children to a higher standard of perfection than we can attain ourselves.” – Rebecca Eanes

53. “Parents with their words, attitudes, and actions possess the ability to bless or curse the identities of their children.” – Craig Hill

54. “We don’t always do the things our parents want us to do, but it is their mistake if they can’t find a way to love us anyway.” – J. Courtney Sullivan

55. “Just because you’re a parent doesn’t mean your needs aren’t important.” – Hilary Duff

Parents Quotes That Will Make You Sad and Emotional

56. “Parents are defined by their mistakes.” – Fredrik Backman

57. “If you’ve never been hated by your child, you’ve never been a parent.” – Bette Davis

58. “It’s difficult seeing parents for who they are rather than who we want them to be.” – Amy Meyerson

59. “The most loving parents and relatives commit murder with smiles on their faces. They force us to destroy the person we really are, a subtle kind of murder.” – Jim Morrison

60. “Don’t anger your parents in order to please other people. Those other people did not spend their lives building yours.” – Anonymous

61. “I’ve learned that regardless of your relationship with your parents, you’ll miss them when they’re gone from your life.” – Maya Angelou

62. “It’s a sad moment, really, when parents first become a bit frightened of their children.” – Ama Ata Aidoo

63. “Children begin by loving their parents. As they grow older, they judge them. Sometimes, they forgive them.” – Oscar Wilde

64. “My parents loved us, but I wasn’t always sure they liked us.” – Tahereh Mafi

65. “When you lose your parents, the sadness doesn’t go away. It just changes. It hits you sideways sometimes instead of head-on, like now.” – Jude Watson

66. “Parents, honestly, sometimes they really do think the world revolves around them.” – Randa Abdel-Fattah

67. “Sometimes just look at your parents as normal human beings, not as your parents.” – Aashu Kandoi

68. “Don’t let yourself become so concerned with raising a good kid that you forget you already have one.” – Glennon Melton

69. “All parents damage their children. It cannot be helped. Youth, like pristine glass, absorbs the prints of its handlers. Some parents smudge, others crack, a few shatter childhoods completely into jagged little pieces beyond repair.” – Mitch Albom

70. “A lot of parents will do anything for their kids except let them be themselves.” – Banksy

Motivational Quotes for All Parents Who Want to Do Better

71. “Children harbor a great many doubts and sorrows that could be eased by a loving hug from a parent.” – Richelle E. Goodrich

72. “While we try to teach our children all about life, our children teach us what life is all about.” – Angela Schwindt

73. “But now, being a parent, I go home and see my son, and I forget about any mistake I ever made or the reason I’m upset. I get home, and my son is smiling, or he comes running to me. It has just made me grow as an individual and grow as a man.” – LeBron James

74. “No matter how far we come, our parents are always in us.” – Brad Meltzer

75. “The daily choices we make as parents to filter what enters our children’s impressionable hearts and minds will go a long way in determining who our children become.” – Mark J. Musser

76. “My parents are my backbone, still are. They’re the only group that will support you if you score 0 or you score 40.” – Kobe Bryant

77. “A perfect parent is a person with excellent child-rearing theories and no actual children.” – Dave Barry

78. “The child supplies the power, but the parents have to do the steering.” – Benjamin Spock

79. “Any parents are as ordinary human beings as others, making them angels or even more is up to their next generation.” – Sandeep Sahajpal

80. “If we are wonderful parents and family members, then there’s really nothing else to prove.” – Ron Baratono

81. “Parents are the ultimate role models for children. Every word, movement, and action has an effect. No other person or outside force has a greater influence on a child than the parent.” – Bob Keeshan

82. “We may not be able to prepare the future for our children, but we can at least prepare our children for the future.” – Franklin D. Roosevelt

83. “Parents can cultivate the character of a child, not the competence of a child.” – Amit Kalantri

84. “My parents taught me about the importance of qualities like kindness, respect, and honesty, and I realize how central values like these have been to me throughout my life.” – Kate Middleton

85. “The most powerful way to change the world is to live in front of our children the way we would like the world to be.” – Anonymous

Parents Quotes to Describe the Experiences of Mothers and Fathers

86. “Parents are not perfect, nor are they saints. Dads and moms make mistakes all the time. How you handle these situations will be an important life lesson for your children.” – Bethany Bridges

87. “A good father is a source of inspiration and self-restraint. A good mother is the root of kindness and humbleness.” – Dr. T.P. Chia

88. “It’s a funny thing about mothers and fathers. Even when their own child is the most disgusting little blister you could ever imagine, they still think that he or she is wonderful.” – Roald Dahl

89. “One of the greatest titles in the world is parent, and one of the biggest blessings in the world is to have parents to call mom and dad.” – Jim DeMint

90. “My mum and dad had worked incredibly hard to afford me an education.” – Benedict Cumberbatch

91. “Listen to your father, who gave you life, and do not despise your mother when she is old.” – Proverbs 23:22

92. “My mother and father continue to provide unwavering support for everything I do. That is a great gift, the foundation of my spirit, that I try to always pay forward.” – Nick Smith

93. “Thank God I had two parents who loved me enough to stay on my case.” – Shaquille O’Neal

94. “Mom and Dad, you’ve gone through a lot of struggle and pain, but I promise I won’t let all that go in vain. I want to do justice to every time you believe in me, and I will grow up to be the best I can be.” – Anonymous

95. “Nothing in my life would have been without your strife. There is nothing I can say can ever truly convey. Nothing that I do can show my gratitude to you. Mom and Dad, you are the best parents by far.” – Anonymous

Quotes About How Great Parents Are

96. “Parents are teachers, guides, leaders, protectors, and providers for their children.” – Iyanla Vanzant

97. “Children should not be burdened with making us happy, nor blamed for making us sad or angry. Children are not responsible for how we feel. We are.” – Larissa Dann

98. “Parents lend children their experience and a vicarious memory. Children endow their parents with a vicarious immortality.” – George Santayana

99. “Being a parent is the greatest trust that has been given to human beings.” – David O. McKay

100. “Everyone else we knew growing up is the same image of their parents, no matter how loud they told themselves they’d be different.” – Tana French

101. “Parents, they didn’t leave you when you were young. So don’t leave them when they are old.” – Anonymous

102. “The greatest gift a parent can give a child is self-confidence.” – Stewart Stafford

103. “Parents are without a doubt one of the most, if not the most, influential role models that their kids will probably have under normal circumstances.” – Joseph R. Parker

104. “I got a lot of support from my parents. That’s the one thing I always appreciated. They didn’t tell me I was being stupid. They told me I was being funny.” – Jim Carrey

105. “The affection of parents makes infants feel safe in this dangerous world and gives them boldness in experimentation and in the exploration of their environments.” – Bertrand Russell

106. “I learned from my parents the idea that, if you are devoted enough and you want to study something enough, you can really teach yourself anything.” – Brit Marling

107. “There is no school equal to a decent home and no teacher equal to a virtuous parent.” – Mahatma Gandhi

108. “Teach love, generosity, good manners, and some of that will drift from the classroom to the home, and who knows, the children will be educating the parents.” – Roger Moore

109. “You spend years wishing your parents would get off your back only to realize they’re the only ones who ever really had your back.” – Anonymous

110. “People come, and people go in life like changing weather. Friends, foes, and colleagues, along with many others. But the only people in life who remain constant are parents like you who believe their kids to be the most important.” – Anonymous

Quotes to Express the Love You Have for Your Parents

111. “Love, respect, and appreciate your parents as it is the one gift they truly cherish and desire.” – Margo Vader

112. “As you get older, you have more respect and empathy for your parents. Now, I have a great relationship with both of them.” – Hugh Jackman

113. “Love your parents and treat them with loving care, for you will only know their value when you see their empty chair.” – Anonymous

114. “Love and appreciate your parents. We are often so busy growing up we forget they are also growing old.” – Anonymous

115. “Do your best for your parents. If you don’t, one day, you will regret it.” – Debasish Mridha

116. “Compassion for our parents is the true sign of maturity.” – Anais Nin

117. “Whether it is the way you comforted me when I was down or the way in which your hugs magically wiped out my frowns. Mom and Dad, you have been there day after day to make sure my life turned out this way.” – Anonymous

118. “I love my parents. Coming out to them was sort of coming out to myself. I educated them, and I wanted our relationship to keep growing. I wanted them to be a part of my life still. I wanted to be able to share with them what I was going through.” – Randy Harrison

119. “Respect your parents because they are the ones who will never let you down at any cost.” – Anisha Upadhyay

120. “I promise to achieve all the dreams of your life that you couldn’t because you were busy making sure that I achieved mine. To my dear parents, thanks for all your sacrifices.” – Anonymous

121. “I love my parents in the way most children would. For having been there at every point in my youth and childhood, ready to pick me up when I fell and support me when I stumbled.” – Michael Gove

122. “But she wasn’t around, and that’s the thing when your parents die, you feel like instead of going into every fight with backup, you are going into every fight alone.” – Mitch Albom

123. “I love my parents a lot. Even if they can be annoying, I know they want the best for me.” – Anonymous

124. “You are the only people in this world who I love from the bottom of my heart, even though you scold me and punish me because I know that what you do is for my own good. Thanks, Mom and Dad.” – Anonymous

125. “Dear Mom and Dad, I am so much of what I learned from you. You’ll be with me like a handprint on my heart.” – Anonymous

Wise Quotes About Parents That Will Make You Think

126. “Parents have to instill the right principles in their children, but then, it’s up to the children to live up to those principles.” – Mary Lydon Simonsen

127. “Where parents do too much for their children, the children will not do much for themselves.” – Elbert Hubbard

128. “When you realize your parents are human, that’s when you lose your innocence.” – Lidia Longorio

129. “It’s especially hard to admit that you made a mistake to your parents because, of course, you know so much more than they do.” – Sean Covey

130. “Parents, deliberately or unaware, teach their children from birth how to behave, drink, feel, and perceive. Liberation from these influences is no easy matter.” – Eric Berne

131. “When you become a parent, you look at your parents differently. You look at being a child differently. It’s an awakening, a revelation that you have.” – Philip Seymour Hoffman

132. “There is nothing more precious to a parent than a child, and nothing more important to our future than the safety of all our children.” – Bill Clinton

133. “Parents of young children should realize that few people, and maybe no one, will find their children as enchanting as they do.” – Barbara Walters

134. “The best security blanket a child can have is parents who respect each other.” – Jane Blaustone

135. “Respect the child. Be not too much his parent. Trespass not on his solitude.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

136. “More than children can know what’s good for their parents, the parents know what’s good for their children.” – VKBoy

137. “We receive our inheritance the day we learn a skill from a parent. How we use that skill will determine how far we go!” – Andrew-Knox B. Kaniki

138. “Parents must get across the idea that ‘I love you always, but sometimes I do not love your behavior.'” – Amy Vanderbilt

139. “With every word we utter, with every action we take, we know our kids are watching us.” – Michelle Obama

140. “Whatever attitude that a parent has concerning their children will most likely be entrenched in the character of these children especially in their early formative years.” – Dan Miller

Quotes That Prove Why Parents Deserve a Lot of Respect

141. “The voice of parents is the voice of gods, for to their children, they are heaven’s lieutenants.” – William Shakespeare

142. “Parents who are afraid to put their foot down usually have children who step on their toes.” – Chinese Proverb

143. “Parents don’t make mistakes because they don’t care, but because they care so deeply.” – Thomas Berry Brazelton

144. “I think when you become a parent, you go from being a star in the movie of your own life to the supporting player in the movie of someone else’s.” – Craig Ferguson

145. “In the happiest of our childhood memories, our parents were happy too.” – Robert Brault

146. “The reason we love our parents is because they loved us first. Every single company should take this advice.” – Gary Vaynerchuk

147. “My parents were supportive of my creativity but did not have a lot of patience for whimsy with zero production value. They had stuff to do.” – Mindy Kaling

148. “The best part about being friends with your parents is that no matter what you do, they have to keep loving you.” – Natalie Portman

149. “I don’t think it matters how many parents you’ve got, as long as those who are around make their presence a good one.” – Elizabeth Wurtzel

150. “Affirming words from moms and dads are like light switches. Speak a word of affirmation at the right moment in a child’s life, and it’s like lighting up a whole roomful of possibilities.” – Gary Smalley

151. “The weird thing is that you’re just not a parent, and then you are. It takes your brain a couple of hours to catch up to that.” – Seth Meyers

152. “Mom and Dad, I have no words to acknowledge the sacrifices you made and the dreams you had to let go just to give me a shot at achieving mine. Thanks.” – Anonymous

153. “If your parents bring you no shame, be very grateful. If you’re proud of them, celebrate.” – Dennis Prager

154. “I think people who have good parents come into the world with strength, yes, and an advantage.” – Oprah Winfrey

155. “In life, nobody except your parents will care to overlook who you have become and continue believing in what you can still be.” – Anonymous

Parents Quotes That Will Tug at Your Heartstrings

156. “The most beautiful thing in the world is to see your parents happy and knowing that you are the reason behind their happiness.” – Anonymous

157. “Most of us become parents long before we have stopped being children.” – Mignon McLaughlin

158. “Parents, keep your children closer when they are young because they will keep you closer when you’re old.” – Anonymous

159. “Never complain about what your parents couldn’t give you. It was probably all they had.” – Anonymous

160. “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. Honor thy father and mother.” – Bible

161. “Parents are often so busy with the physical rearing of children that they miss the glory of parenthood, just as the grandeur of the trees is lost when raking leaves.” – Marcelene Cox

162. “Becoming a parent erased many of my negative childhood feelings and filled them in with something new.” – Mariska Hargitay

163. “At the end of the day, the most overwhelming key to a child’s success is the positive involvement of parents.” – Jane Dee Hull

164. “When your parents are not rich but still afford to give you a beautiful life, appreciate their sacrifices.” – Anonymous

165. “When I was a kid, my parents moved a lot, but I always found them.” – Rodney Dangerfield

166. “Be sure to spend time with your parents while you can, because one day, when you look up from your busy life, they won’t be there anymore!” – Anonymous

167. “Always kiss your children goodnight, even if they’re already asleep.” – Harriett Jackson Brown Jr. 

168. “It’s not always about convincing your parents of what you want to do but just saying, ‘This is what I’m doing. This is what I love.'” – Stormzy

169. “You can’t teach children to behave better by making them feel worse. When children feel better, they behave better.” – Pam Lee

170. “Mom and Dad, thanks for believing in me even when I kept blaming you for not doing so.” – Anonymous

Short but Sweet Parents Quotes

171. “Children learn to smile from their parents.” – Shinichi Suzuki

172. “Honor your parents.” – Anonymous

173. “Next to God, thy parents.” – William Penn

174. “Whatever the parents are doing, the kids will follow suit.” – Bob Harper

175. “Some parents could do more for their children by not doing so much for them.” – Anonymous

176. “They’ve got great parents. I’m just trying to be the fun uncle .” – Sarah Silverman

177. “When we’re young, parents prepare us for the future.” – Anonymous

178. “Parents live for us. They’re happy when we are happy.” – Anonymous

179. “You cannot let your parents anywhere near your real humiliations.” – Alice Munro

180. “Your children need your presence more than your presents.” – Jesse Jackson

181. “That’s what children are for, that their parents may not be bored.” – Ivan Turgenev

182. “Nurturing never happens in a rush.” – Emma Scheib

183. “It’s not only children who grow, parents do too.” – Joyce Maynard

184. “Of course, parents are the most important people in a child’s life.” – Hillary Clinton

185. “There are no words to describe how much I love my parents.” – Anonymous

Quotes to Appreciate All the Things Parents Do

186. “As a parent, you can’t completely avoid making mistakes. Accept it. The best you can do is to study your children, learn from your mistakes, and focus wisely on their upbringing.” – Gary Ezzo

187. “As parents, we guide by our unspoken example. It is only when we’re talking to them that our kids aren’t listening.” – Robert Brault

188. “Parents need to fill a child’s bucket of self-esteem so high that the rest of the world can’t poke enough holes to make it dry.” – Alvin H. Price

189. “The miracle of children is that we just don’t know how they will change or who they will become.” – Eileen Kennedy-Moore

190. “Children have never been very good at listening to their elders, but they have never failed to imitate them.” – James Baldwin

191. “Kids learn the difference between good and bad and right and wrong from their parents. One way they learn which behaviors and actions a parent wants are by how a parent responds.” – David Leads

192. “Your parents, proudly here today, and their parents before them, perhaps proudly here today, understood a simple equation for success: your children would do better than you had.” – Anna Quindlen

193. “If you want your children to improve, let them overhear the nice things you say about them to others.” – Haim Ginott

194. “It definitely takes a village to raise a child, as the old saying goes, but you as the parent are the key to providing the support your kid needs to be successful in life.” – Milton Stewart

195. “In some sense, every parent does love their children. But some parents are too broken to love them well.” – Paul Young

196. “Every parent is at some time the father of the unreturned prodigal, with nothing to do but keep his house open to hope.” – John Ciardi

197. “First babies have the often unenviable task of turning people into parents.” – Penelope Leach

198. “Don’t try to make children grow up to be like you, or they may do it.” – Russell Baker

199. “It’s very hard for our parents who see us enter a world that they can’t imagine.” – Alice Walker

200. “Mom and Dad, for all that you’ve been to us, for all you’ve done for us, for all that you are. We love you!” – Anonymous

More Quotes About Parents

201. “Have you ever noticed how parents can go from the most wonderful people in the world to totally embarrassing in three seconds?” – Rick Riordan

202. “Are parents always more ambitious for their children than they are for themselves?” – Jeffrey Archer

203. “Dear Mom and Dad, no matter how badly I failed, I always knew that you would treat me like a winner. Thanks for being so supportive.” – Anonymous

204. “A child who is allowed to be disrespectful to his parents will not have true respect for anyone.” – Billy Graham

205. “The reasonableness of the command to obey parents is clear to children, even when quite young.” – Noah Webster

206. “The thing about lying to your parents is, you have to do it to protect them. It’s for their own good.” – Sophie Kinsella

207. “Thank you, dear parents, for opening your arms for me every time the world closed its doors on my face. Without you, I could have been lost in the dark alleys. I love you so much.” – Anonymous

208. “A day in a year is not enough to be thankful for the sacrifices our parents make 365 days a year.” – Anonymous

209. “Dear Mom and Dad, I never expressed in words how much I love you, but today, I want to thank you for the wonderful gifts, your blessings, and your teachings in my life meaningful.” – Anonymous

210. “I love you, Mom and Dad, because of your unconditional love and affection all the time. You both have always been caring and loving and stand by my side in the hour of need. You have shown me the world.” – Anonymous

Did These Quotes Make You Treasure Your Parents More?

No one can survive living in this harsh world alone, especially if you are a child. As we grow up, our parents are the people who will provide us with the protection and knowledge we need to be independent. Even if we become adults, they will back us up if we need help and support.

No matter how hard life is, our parents will always offer us their hugs and love. They are one of the most selfless beings that serve as sunshine in our darkest days. 

We hope that this collection was able to make you cherish and respect your parents more. Having a child is no easy path, and it is a journey that you will only understand once you have your own. So, don’t hesitate and show your parents how much you love and support them too.

Which parents quote warmed your heart the most? Share it with us in the comments section below.

• 80 New Parents Quotes to Support You in Parenthood
• 50 Single Dad Quotes to Motivate & Encourage Solo Parents
• 30 Absent Father Quotes That’ll Serve as Your Wake-up Call

Karen Danao

Hi, I’m Karen , a content curator and writer for Quote Ambition; I’m also a marketing and advertising professional. Beyond the keyboard and the screen, I’m someone who’s out to enjoy every bit that life has to offer!

Poetry, philosophy, history, and movies are all topics I love writing about! However, my true passion is in traveling, photography, and finding common ground to which everyone from different cultures can relate.

With the many places I’ve been to, I found that love, inspiration, and happiness are some things that bring people together. No matter how different we are on the outside, I’m a true believer that our emotions don’t lie; if you dig deep into our psyche, we’re all the same inside.

This belief was further amplified when I joined Quote Ambition. Through the quotes I’ve read, collected, organized, and written about, I found that humans are resilient, creative, and compassionate.

We take from each others’ hearts and courage, and it’s through our individual experiences that we learn how to rise above our challenges and pain. In so many ways, Quote Ambition is a platform that allows people from all over the world to gain the inspiration they need anytime, anywhere!

You can find me on MuckRack and LinkedIn .

Inspirational Parenting Quotes

Searching the best inspirational parenting quotes to capture what it means to be a parent?

Then these inspirational quotes about parenting are sure to remind you how amazing being a parent can be!

As these parenting quotes show, there really is nothing else quite like being a parent!

It is a journey of highs and lows and everything in between as you navigate your way around raising your children.

Yet one thing is certain, being a parent is one of the most rewarding and incredible things you will ever get to do.

So, whether you are just starting your parenting journey or you’re just looking for some inspiration, these quotes on parenting are sure to inspire you.

Here you’ll find the best quotes about parenting , inspirational parenting quotes, being a parent quotes, quotes about raising children, new parenting quotes, proud parents quotes, and parent quotes to child to share on any occasion.

And if you love these quotes on parenting, make sure you also check out these proud parents quotes and I love my kids quotes . Or even these inspirational quotes for kids .

Best Parenting Quotes

‘What an honor parenting is. To get to be a little someone’s everything. To love them and guide them. And treasure them for the rest of your life.’

Editors note: You are welcome to share and use the original quotes – parenting and images contained below. Please give credit back to our page. Non-commercial use only.

‘There is no such thing as a perfect parent. So just be the best one you can be.’

‘As a parent, the greatest gift I can give my child is my time, my love, and my attention.’

‘The sign of great parenting is not the child’s behavior. The sign of great parenting is the parent’s behavior.’ – Andy Smithson

‘As a parent, I am not perfect. I forget things. I lose my cool. And some days I go a little crazy. But it’s okay, because in the end, no one could ever love my child the way I do.’

‘Parenting is the easiest thing in the world to have an opinion about, but the hardest thing in the world to do.’ – Matt Walsh

‘Children are great imitators, and our role as parents it gives them something great to imitate.’

‘The hardest parenting challenges are the most important ones.’

‘We never know the love of a parent till we become parents ourselves.’ – Henry Ward Beecher

‘Great parenting happens when you start controlling yourself and stop controlling your child.’

‘Parenting is 50% feeling like your head might explode, and 50% feeling like your heart might.’

‘Having a parent who listens creates a child who believes he or she has a voice that matters in this world.’ – Rachel Macy Stafford

‘Parenting is hard. It’s challenging, messy, crazy, and exhausting. And yet it’s still unbelievably beautiful.’

You may also like these positive parenting tips !

Inspiring Parenting Quotes

‘As a parent, you’re going to get advice from a lot of people, but innately you know what your child needs. You can take bits and pieces of advice, but never forget to trust your own parenting instincts. They are there for a reason.’

‘The best kind of parent you can be is to lead by example.’ – Drew Barrymore

‘Parenting is hard, especially when trying to be patient with little versions on impatient you.’

‘Parenting is about raising, loving, and celebrating the child you have, not the child you thought you would have.’

‘As a parent, loving your children for who they are, while they figure out who they want to be, is one of the most powerful gifts we could ever give them.’

‘Hearing your child say, ‘I love you’ makes your whole parenting journey worth it.’

‘Out of all the parents in the world, you were picked to be theirs.’

‘Parenting is about showing up. Day after day. Night after night. On the good days and the hard days. Everyday. Loving your kids. That is what matters.’

‘Great parenting is being a worthy example for your children.’

‘As parents, we have the responsibility and privilege of setting the tone in our homes. It doesn’t matter what is happening outside those four walls, we have the ability to create a refuge, a place of love, a home for our children.’

‘Parenting is so much simpler when you stop explaining yourself to others and just do what works for you and your family.’

Inspirational Parent Quotes

‘There is no way to be a perfect parent and a million ways to be a good one.’ – Jill Churchill

‘Bad moments don’t make bad parents.’

‘Parents who feel guilty about not doing enough are usually the ones doing everything possible.’

‘Never doubt, you were made to be their parent.’

‘Don’t try to hide your imperfections from your children. Let them know it is okay to mess up and apologize. Let them know it is okay to cry. Show them how to cope when they are struggling. Because when they think their parents are perfect, they believe they need to be perfect too. And perfection is an impossible expectation to try to live up to.’

‘You’re the only one who gets to choose the kind of parent your kids have. Choose wisely.’

‘If you’re worried about being a good parent, it means you already are one.’

‘As a parent, you just need to look at your child, and you can feel your heart exploding with unconditional love for them.’

‘Well loved children become good hearted adults.’

‘Nobody on earth can ever love you more than your parents.’

 ‘Being a parent is tough, but always remember in the eyes of your child, no one does it better than you.’

‘It’s ok to have strengths and weaknesses as a parent. Some parents play games, others listen well, some cook with love, and others are great encouragers. We don’t have to be everything, every day to our kids. We just need to show up and love them hard.’

Motivational Parent Quotes

‘Being a parent is amazing. And then it is really hard. And then it is incredible. And then it is everything in between. So, hold onto the good, breathe through the bad, and welcome the wildest and most beautiful ride of your life.’

‘Being a parent is the best reason you’ll ever have to take care of youself.’

‘Being a parent is learning about strengths you didn’t know you had and dealing with fears you never knew existed.’

‘As a parent, I pray my kids always know how loved and adored they are. There is nothing more important to me in life than them.’

‘Being a parent isn’t easy, but it is definitely the best job anyone could ever have.’

‘Being a parent means finding strength for your child, even when your soul is tired.’

‘There are many things in life I have taken for granted, but the opportunity and ability to be a parent will never be one of them.’

‘I think the best part of being a parent is when your little one looks up at you and just smiles and stares because they know you are their person. Like nobody else is as important as you. They know that you have them like nobody else ever will. The connection is indescribable.’

‘Being a parent to your child is not a job, it is a privilege and something to be cherished.’

‘Being a parent has made me so tired. And so happy.’

‘Becoming a parent is the moment when all of life’s battles suddenly seem worth fighting for.’

Inspirational Quotes About Parents

‘It’s not our job to toughen our children to face a cruel and heartless world. It’s our job to raise children whole will make the world a little less cruel and heartless.’ – L.R.Knost

‘As a parent, I am going to do everything I can to raise kids who make this world a better place.’

‘As a parent, I don’t want my children to follow in my footsteps. I want them to take the path next to me and go further than I could have ever dreamt possible.’

‘Parents speak life into your children. Tell them all the incredible things they are and can do. So, when the time comes, they will have what it takes to follow their own path.’

‘I hope my children always know that they were wished for, prayed for, and that they are forever loved.’

‘As your parent, I can’t promise to fix all your problems, but I can promise you won’t have to face them alone.’

‘No matter what happens, I hope my children will be able to look back and say, ‘my parents loved me through it.’’

‘As a parent, there is no greater honor than watching your child grow up.’

‘Life affords no greater responsibility, no greater privilege, than the raising of the next generation.’ – C Everett Koop

‘Raising a child might mean that my hands are full, but so is my heart.’

‘The way we talk to our children becomes their inner voice.’ – Peggy O’Mara

Inspirational Quotes About Parenting

‘Behind every young child who believes in themselves is a parent who believed first.’

‘The funny thing about parenting is, we try our best to teach our children all about life, but really they are the ones teaching us what life is all about.’

‘You can be a mess and still be a good parent. We are allowed to be both.’

‘Sometimes it takes a little hand reaching out for yours to remind you that these are, without a doubt the best years of your life.’

‘A parent doesn’t try to hold their child back or take the path for them. Their job is to light the path with their love so they can always find their way home.’

‘Having a bond with your child is something money can’t buy.’

‘There is no influence as great as that of a parent.’

‘Life is better with my kids.’

‘Be the parent you needed when you were young.’

‘Remember, you don’t have to explain your family’s parenting choices to anyone.’

Encouraging Quotes About Parenting

‘No parent is always conscious, gentle, positive, peaceful, and authentic. We have to choose to be and practice moment by moment, day after day. The more we practice, the stronger we grow.’ – Lelia Schott

‘At the end of the day, the most overwhelming key to a child’s success is the positive involvement of parents.’ – Jane D. Hull

‘Don’t judge other parents, you don’t know what cards parenting has dealt them.’

‘A parent never stops being an example for their child.’

‘A parent understands what their child does not say.’

‘As a parent, every time I think of my child, I can’t help but smile.’

‘A child is always on their parent’s mind and forever in their heart.’

‘There is no friendship, no love, like that of a parent for their child.’ – Henry Ward Beecher

Final Thoughts On Motivational Parenting Quotes

Being a parent isn’t easy, but even on your hardest of days you wouldn’t trade being a parent for anything.

We hope these parenting journey quotes and motivational parenting quotes have inspired you!

And if you’re looking for more great quotes, then check out these guides on inspiring motherhood quotes , quotes about parents , step parent quotes , and inspirational quotes for new parents .

57 Best Parenting Quotes and Sayings to Live By

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Becoming a parent is a bit like being electrocuted – it’s a shock to the system.

Both situations come with a rather rude awakening while sending tingles down your spine. And (depending on what you electrocuted yourself with) both can light up your world in a very special way.

As a new parent, your priorities shift. And rather than life being all about you , it's about nurturing and caring for another human being.

The sudden burst of responsibility can be daunting. But remember, you’re not alone in this journey. There will always be someone willing to offer a hand of support, be it a friend or family member.

And, you may find parenting quotes, such as the ones below, helpful to read as they'll provide comfort, advice, and encouragement when you need it the most.

Table of Contents

Why Is Parenting Such a Tough Ride?

There’s nothing quite like having a mushed-up banana rusk thrown in your face at 6 am. Literally nothing.

The smell stays with you all day long, as does the laughter that bellowed from the small human being who launched the offensive weapon at you. And it completely melts your heart.

That’s parenting pretty much in a nutshell: a series of mishaps that often require clean clothes. And an abundance of smiles and hugs that can overwrite the bad moods.

It’s not always easy. And, as the rusk-throwing babies grow up into toddlers and teenagers, and even young adults, there are days when you won’t feel like you’re winning.

But that's okay. Parenting isn’t a competition where the goal is to come out on top.

Instead, it's about nurturing and supporting your child as they grow and develop. It's about creating a loving and safe environment where they can thrive and become the best version of themselves.

So, don't worry about winning or losing – raising a child isn’t a game of chess.

Just focus on being there. Focus on bedtime stories and soccer matches, on dance recitals, and homemade cookies.

Focus on being their shoulder to cry on, and their biggest fan on the pitch. And most importantly, focus on building a strong and trusting relationship so that you both know, that no matter what happens, they can come to you.

Parenting doesn’t come with a handbook. There’s no Dummy’s guide to toddlers. And no downloadable app to get through the teen years.

But you don’t need it. With love, and kindness, and more patience than you thought humanly possible, you’ll find a way that works for your family. And that’s the key – finding a way that works for you, rather than the Smiths down the road, or the celebs on TV.

You’ve got this. Have faith in your own abilities. And if you still need a little encouragement, these parenting quotes are just the ticket.

So let’s get started.

• “I came to parenting the way most of us do — knowing nothing and trying to learn everything.” – Mayim Bialik
• “Always kiss your children goodnight, even if they're already asleep.” – H. Jackson Brown, Jr.
• “We are apt to forget that children watch examples better than they listen to preaching” – Roy L. Smith
• “My children are the reason I laugh, smile, and want to get up every morning.” – Gena Lee Nolin
• “Encourage and support your kids because children are apt to live up to what you believe of them.” – Lady Bird Johnson
• “It’s not only children who grow. Parents do too. As much as we watch to see what our children do with their lives, they are watching us to see what we do with ours. I can’t tell my children to reach for the sun. All I can do is reach for it, myself.” – Joyce Maynard

It’s not only children who grow. Parents do too. As much as we watch to see what our children do with their lives, they are watching us to see what we do with ours. I can’t tell my children to reach for the sun. All I can do is reach for it, myself.” – Joyce Maynard

• “Having a child is like getting a tattoo … on your face. You better be committed.” – Elizabeth Gilbert
• “In any given moment we have two options: To step forward into growth or to step back into safety.” – Abraham Maslow ​
• “There really are places in the heart you don't even know exist until you love a child.” – Anne Lamott
• “Your kids require you most of all to love them for who they are, not to spend your whole time trying to correct them.” – Bill Ayers
• “You can learn many things from children. How much patience you have, for instance.” – Franklin P. Adams
• “There is no such thing as a perfect parent. So just be a real one.” – Sue Atkins

• “Being a parent is like being a superhero. Every day, you’re someone’s hero.” – Unknown
• “Having children is like living in a frat house — nobody sleeps, everything’s broken, and there’s a lot of throwing up.” – Ray Romano
• “We’re all imperfect parents, and that’s perfectly okay. Tiny humans need connection, not perfection.” – LR Knos t
• “There’s no way to be a perfect mother and a million ways to be a good one.” – Jill Churchill
• “The truth is, parenting as well as we can is always hard – really, truly, the hardest thing any of us has ever done.” – Laura Markham
• “Parenting shouldn’t feel like a competitive sport. It’s plenty challenging without any added obstacles. Strive to be loving and kind; have the courage to ask for help; take a break when you need it; celebrate all the great stuff; be kind to yourself, and be yourself. That’s who your kid loves anyways.” – Ariadne Brill

Parenting shouldn’t feel like a competitive sport. It’s plenty challenging without any added obstacles. Strive to be loving and kind; have the courage to ask for help; take a break when you need it; celebrate all the great stuff; be kind to yourself, and be yourself. That’s who your kid loves anyways.” – Ariadne Brill

• “Parents are the ultimate role models for children. Every word, every movement, and action affects. No other person or outside force has a greater influence on a child than a parent.” – Bob Keeshan
• “One of the greatest titles in the world is a parent, and one of the biggest blessings in the world is to have parents to call mom and dad.” – Jim DeMint
• “Children are like little bundles of hope and joy, teaching us to love boundlessly and unconditionally.” – Unknown
• “Parenting is the biggest sacrifice one can make. It’s putting your life on hold to fulfill the promise of your children’s tomorrow.” – Unknown
• “Parents need to fill a child’s bucket of self-esteem so high that the rest of the world can’t poke enough holes to drain it dry.” – Alvin Price
• “It takes a village to raise a child. Don’t be afraid to ask for help.” – Unknown

• “People who say they sleep like a baby usually don’t have one.” – Leo Burke
• “There’s nothing called a perfect parent, so just be a real one.” – Sue Atkins
• “I may not be able to give my kids everything they want, but I give them what they need: love, time, and attention. You can’t buy those things.” – Nishan Panwar
• The children are our future. Teach them well and let them lead the way. Show them all the beauty they possess inside.” – Whitney Houston
• “Having kids is like living in a zoo – every day is an adventure, and you never know what you’re going to see next!” – Unknown
• “No one is ever quite ready; everyone is always caught off guard. Parenthood chooses you. And you open your eyes, look at what you’ve got, say “Oh, my gosh,” and recognize that of all the balls there ever were, this is the one you should not drop. It’s not a question of choice.” – Marisa de Los Santos

No one is ever quite ready; everyone is always caught off guard. Parenthood chooses you. And you open your eyes, look at what you’ve got, say “Oh, my gosh,” and recognize that of all the balls there ever were, this is the one you should not drop. It’s not a question of choice.” – Marisa de Los Santos

• “A father’s goodness is higher than the mountain, a mother’s goodness deeper than the sea.” – Japanese proverb
• “If you’re completely exhausted and don’t know how you’re going to keep giving this much of yourself day after day, you’re probably a good parent.” – Bunmi Laditan
• “Your children need your presence more than your presents.” – Jesse Jackson
• “When your children are teenagers, it’s important to have a dog so that someone in the house is happy to see you.” – Nora Ephron
• “Every word, facial expression, gesture, or action on the part of a parent gives the child some message about self-worth.” – Virginia Satir
• “Biology is the least of what makes someone a mother.” – Oprah Winfrey

• “If you have never been hated by your child, you’ve never been a parent.” – Bette Davis
• “Having children just puts the whole world into perspective. Everything else just disappears.” – Kate Winslet
• “Children need love, especially when they do not deserve it.” – Harold Hubert
• “Motherhood has taught me the meaning of living in the moment and being at peace. Children don’t think about yesterday, and they don’t think about tomorrow. They just exist in the moment.” – Jessalyn Gilsig
• “Be the parent today that you want your kids to remember tomorrow.” – Unknown
• “If you raise your children to feel that they can accomplish any goal or task they decide upon, you will have succeeded as a parent, and you will have given your children the greatest of all blessings.” – Brian Tracy

If you raise your children to feel that they can accomplish any goal or task they decide upon, you will have succeeded as a parent, and you will have given your children the greatest of all blessings.” – Brian Tracy

• “Children learn more from what you are than what you teach them.” – WEB DuBois
• “Hugs can do great amounts of good – especially for children.” – Princess Diana
• “The thing about parenting rules is there aren’t any. That’s what makes it so difficult.” – Ewan McGregor
• “Parenting without a sense of humor is like being an accountant who sucks at math.” – Amber Dusick
• “Children start out loving their parents, but as they grow older and discover their parents are human, they become judgmental. And sometimes, when they mature, they forgive their parents, especially when they discover they are also human.” – Oscar Wilde
• “Parenting is not for sissies. You have to sacrifice and grow up.” – Jillian Michaels

• “ Parenthood …it’s about guiding the next generation and forgiving the last.” – Peter Krause
• “Behind every young child who believes in himself is a parent who believed first.” – Matthew Jacobson
• “Parenting is a lifetime job and does not stop when a child grows up.” – Jake Slope
• “Affirming words from moms and dads are like light switches. Speak a word of affirmation at the right moment in a child’s life and it’s like lighting up a whole roomful of possibilities.” – Gary Smalley
• “Parenting is the easiest thing in the world to have an opinion about, but the hardest thing in the world to do.” – Matt Walsh
• “The point of parenting isn’t to have all the answers before we start out but instead to figure it out on the go as our children grow, because as they do, so will we.” – Bridgett Miller

The point of parenting isn’t to have all the answers before we start out but instead to figure it out on the go as our children grow, because as they do, so will we.” – Bridgett Miller

• “The way we talk to our children becomes their inner voice.” –  Peggy O’Mara
• “Being a parent is like trying to fly a kite in a windstorm – exciting, unpredictable, and always an adventure!” – Unknown
• “We never know the love of a parent till we become parents ourselves.” – Henry Ward Beecher

Final Thoughts on Parenting

If ever there was a challenge, parenting is it. There’s no faster ride, no scarier turns, and no bigger bumps in the track than this.

But in the same breath, there’s not a single more rewarding part to play in someone’s life, than to be their Mom or Dad. To be the person a child looks up to, feels safe with, and can depend on throughout life.

So while you may not have all the parenting answers, know that by being there, you’re doing a great job. Give yourself a pat on the back. And look forward to all the beautiful memories you’re going to make together.

For more inspirational quotes, be sure to check out these blog posts:

• 79 Powerful Compassion Quotes About Showing Empathy
• 55 I’m Here for You Quotes to Say to a Loved One
• 100 Kindness Quotes and Sayings About Showing Warmth

Finally, if you want to use these quotes to make a lasting change to your life, then check out and recite these 57 affirmations for success .

40 Best Parenting Quotes of All Time

By Kim Bongiorno

The best parenting quotes capture the wonder (and humor) of having children . I mean, there is nothing like parenthood, from the moment you realize you’re about to become one , to seeing your kids all grown up. Here, I’ve rounded up the most amazing parenting quotes around. They’ll inspire you, make you laugh, and more.

1. “No one is ever quite ready; everyone is always caught off guard. Parenthood chooses you. And you open your eyes, look at what you’ve got, say “Oh, my gosh,” and recognize that of all the balls there ever were, this is the one you should not drop. It’s not a question of choice.” ― Marisa de los Santos , author of  Love Walked In

2. “I came to parenting the way most of us do — knowing nothing and trying to learn everything.” — Mayim Bialik , actress and neuroscientist

3. “Everyone should have kids. They are the greatest joy in the world. But they are also terrorists. You’ll realize this as soon as they’re born, and they start using sleep deprivation to break you.” — Ray Romano , actor and comedian

4. “The beauty of motherhood is not in the freshly pressed shirts and smiling photos we show the world. The beauty of motherhood is in the folds and creases of our lives, the grimaces and tantrums , the moments when we have to grit our teeth to get through, when we pound on windows and yell and scream and demand better of each other and ourselves.” — Robyn Passante , blogger

Parenting Quote #5:  “Encourage and support your kids because children are apt to live up to what you believe of them.” — Lady Bird Johnson , former First Lady of the United States

6. “I feel very blessed to have two wonderful, healthy children who keep me completely grounded, sane and throw up on my shoes just before I go to an awards show just so I know to keep it real.” — Reese Witherspoon , actress

7. “Parenting without a sense of humor is like being an accountant who sucks at math.” — Amber Dusick , blogger

8. “Parenting is not for sissies. You have to sacrifice and grow up.” — Jillian Michaels , trainer and TV personality

9. “ Pregnancy and motherhood are the most beautiful and significantly life-altering events that I have ever experienced.” — Elisabeth Hasselbeck , TV personality

10. “Having a baby dragged me, kicking and screaming, from the world of self-absorption.” — Paul Reiser , comedian

11. “I don’t think it matters how many parents you’ve got, as long as those who are around make their presence a good one.” ― Elizabeth Wurtzel , author of  Prozac Nation

12. “Behind every young child who believes in himself is a parent who believed first.” — Matthew Jacobson , blogger

Parenting Quote #13:  “ Affirming words from moms and dads are like light switches. Speak a word of affirmation at the right moment in a child’s life and it’s like lighting up a whole roomful of possibilities.” — Gary Smalley , family therapist

14. “The way we talk to our children becomes their inner voice.” — Peggy O’Mara , blogger

15. “Motherhood has completely changed me. It’s just about like the most completely humbling experience that I’ve ever had. I think that it puts you in your place because it really forces you to address the issues that you claim to believe in and if you can’t stand up to those principles when you’re raising a child, forget it.” — Diane Keaton , actress

16. “You can learn many things from children. How much patience you have, for instance.” ―  Franklin P. Adams , newspaper columnist

17. “Dad needs to show an incredible amount of respect and humor and friendship toward his mate so the kids understand their parents are sexy, they’re fun, they do things together, they’re best friends. Kids learn by example. If I respect Mom, they’re going to respect Mom.” — Tim Allen , actor

18. “Motherhood was the great equalizer for me; I started to identify with everybody… as a mother, you have that impulse to wish that no child should ever be hurt, or abused, or go hungry, or not have opportunities in life.” — Annie Lennox , singer

Parenting Quote #19: “Biology is the least of what makes someone a mother.” — Oprah Winfrey , TV host, actress, and philanthropist

20. “People expect you to change when you become a mother, and of course my priorities changed when I had Violet. She’s number one in my life and the best thing that ever happened to me, but I still have fun. I am still myself, but that is made out to seem like I am rebelling against motherhood.” — Imelda May , musician

21. “The thing about parenting rules is there aren’t any. That’s what makes it so difficult.” — Ewan McGregor , actor

22. “No matter how much time you spend reading books or following your intuition, you’re gonna screw it up. Fifty times. You can’t do parenting right.” — Alan Arkin , actor

23. “I don’t know what’s more exhausting about parenting: the getting up early, or acting like you know what you’re doing.” ― Jim Gaffigan , actor and comedian

24. “My doctors told me I would never walk again. My mother told me I would. I believed my mother.” — Wilma Rudolph , Olympian

25. “There are so many quiet times you spend as a mother that aren’t glorified but are a foundation for your kids. No matter what, there was always a thick safety net under this trapeze.” — Tina Fey , actress and comedian

Parenting Quote #26: “Trust yourself. You know more than you think you do.” ― Benjamin Spock , pediatrician

27. “My worst parenting moments, the ones I am least proud of, happened because I was trying to impress a bunch of strangers I’ll probably never see again.” — Janel Mills , blogger

28. “Being a mother is learning about strengths you didn’t know you had, and dealing with fears you didn’t know existed.” — Linda Wooten , writer

29. “The best advice my mom has ever given me is to never give up. She believes when one door shuts, another door opens. Always, always move forward.” — Melissa Rivers , TV personality

30. “For me, being a mother made me a better professional, because coming home every night to my girls reminded me what I was working for. And being a professional made me a better mother, because by pursuing my dreams, I was modeling for my girls how to pursue their dreams.” — Michelle Obama , First Lady of the United States

31. “I became the kind of parent my mother was to me.” — Maya Angelou , poet

32. “If John Lennon was right that life is what happens when you’re making other plans, parenthood is what happens when everything is flipped over and spilling everywhere and you can’t find a towel or a sponge or your ‘inside’ voice.” ― Kelly Corrigan ,   author of Lift

33. “If you bungle raising your children, I don’t think whatever else you do matters very much.” — Jackie Kennedy , former First Lady of the United States

34. “Having kids — the responsibility of rearing good, kind, ethical, responsible human beings — is the biggest job anyone can embark on. As with any risk, you have to take a leap of faith and ask lots of wonderful people for their help and guidance. I thank God every day for giving me the opportunity to parent.” ― Maria Shriver , journalist

35. “To raise a child, it sometimes takes a village…but sometimes that village should shut up and mind their own business.” — Susan McLean , blogger

Parenting Quote #36:  “The best kind of parent you can be is to lead by example.” — Drew Barrymore , actress

37. “I don’t remember who said this, but there really are places in the heart you don’t even know exist until you love a child.” ― Anne Lamott , author of  Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son’s First Year

38. “We cannot always build the future for our youth, but we can build our youth for the future,” Franklin D. Roosevelt , 32nd President of the United States

39. “Parenthood…it’s about guiding the next generation and forgiving the last.” — Peter Krause , actor

40. “I looked on childrearing not only as a work of love and duty but as a profession that was fully interesting and challenging as any honourable profession in the world and one that demanded the best that I could bring to it.” — Rose Kennedy , socialite and philanthropist

Kim Bongiorno is an author, freelance writer, and the award-winning blogger behind Let Me Start By Saying . She lives in New Jersey with her handsome husband and two charmingly loud kids, who she pretends to listen to while playing on Facebook and Twitter. If she were less tired, she'd totally add something really clever to her bio so you'd never forget this moment. Visit Kim on Facebook,   Twitter , and Pinteres t.

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150+ Sweetest Quotes About Parent’s Love

One aspect of parenthood that’s indisputable for most parent-child relationships is that parents love like no other and the love parents have is unconditional. These quotes about parent’s love can be used in many ways. For example, they can be said in appreciation of amazing parents, as a parenting quote in a card, or as a gift on Mother’s or Father’s Day. Children have heard their parents quote old advice or inspirational words, and these quotes aim to help them connect even further. Whether the reader of this article is a set of wonderful parents looking for advice, or loving children looking to share appreciation , enjoy the parent’s love quotes below.

Endearing Quotes About Parents’ Love Being Unconditional

“A parent’s love is whole no matter how many times divided.” – Robert Brault

“We don’t always do the things our parents want us to do, but it is their mistake if they can’t find a way to love us anyway.” – J. Courtney Sullivan

“They’re your parents. They’re meant to love you because . Never in spite .” – Patrick Ness

“It is the sunlight of parental love and encouragement that enables a child to grow in competence and slowly gain mastery over his environment.” – Felicity Bauer

“My parents are my backbone. Still are. They’re the only group that will support you if you score zero or you score 40.” – Kobe Bryant

“In the happiest of our childhood memories, our parents were happy, too.” – Robert Brault

“ No matter how far we come, our parents are always in us.” – Brad Meltzer

“Parents were the only ones obligated to love you; from the rest of the world, you had to earn it.” – Ann Brashares

“Love is the chain whereby to bind a child to its parents.” – Abraham Lincoln

“Ohana means family. Family means nobody gets left behind or forgotten.” – Lilo & Stitch

“Nobody on earth can ever love you more than your parents.” – Unknown

“There is no friendship, no love, like that of the parent for the child.” – Henry Ward Beecher

“I carry your heart. I carry it in my heart.” – e. e. cummings

“It’s a funny thing about mothers and fathers. Even when their own child is the most disgusting little blister you could ever imagine, they still think that he or she is wonderful.” – Roald Dahl

“Parental love is the only love that is truly selfless, unconditional, and forgiving.” – Dr. T.P. Chia

“Behind every young child who believes in himself is a parent who believed first.” – Matthew Jacobson

“Making the decision to have a child is momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body.” – Elizabeth Stone

“What it’s like to be a parent: It’s one of the hardest things you’ll ever do, but in exchange, it teaches you the meaning of unconditional love.” – Nicholas Sparks

“Children must never work for our love; they must rest in it.” – Gordon Neufeld

Insightful Parents Quotes About Parenthood

“We never know the love of a parent till we become parents ourselves.” – Henry Ward Beecher

“To understand your parents’ love, you must raise children yourself.” – Chinese Proverb

“Love your parents. We are so busy growing up, we often forget they are also growing old.” – Unknown

“Parenting is not for everybody. It changes your life. Especially when they’re little.” – Tori Amos

“The most rewarding aspect of parenting is seeing my children be authentic. The most rewarding thing for me is to see them do anything that they’re proud of.” – Jamie Lee Curtis

“Our parents deserve our honor and respect for giving us life itself. Beyond this, they almost always made countless sacrifices as they cared for and nurtured us through our infancy and childhood, provided us with the necessities of life, and nursed us through physical illnesses and the emotional stresses of growing up.” – Ezra Taft Benson

“Love your parents and treat them with loving care. For you will only know their value when you see their empty chair.” – Unknown

“Parenting is a lifetime job and does not stop when a child grows up.” – Jake Slope

“Parents aren’t the people you come from. They’re the people you want to be when you grow up.” – Jodie Picoult

“To be in your children’s memories tomorrow, you have to be in their lives today.” – Barbara Johnson

“The thing about parenting rules is there aren’t any. That’s what makes it so difficult.” – Ewan McGregor

“My mum and dad had worked incredibly hard to afford me an education.” – Benedict Cumberbatch

“One of the greatest titles in the world is parent, and one of the biggest blessings in the world is to have parents to call mom and dad.” – Jim DeMint

“Parents are, without a doubt, one of the most, if not the most influential role models that their kids will probably have under normal circumstances.” – Joseph R. Parker

“The child supplies the power, but the parents have to do the steering.” – Benjamin Spock

“Parents are the ultimate role models for children. Every word, movement, and action has an effect. No other person or outside force has a greater influence on a child than the parent.” – Bob Keeshan

“When you become a parent, you look at your parents differently. You look at being a child differently. It’s an awakening, a revelation that you have.” – Philip Seymour Hoffman

“At the end of the day, the most overwhelming key to a child’s success is the positive involvement of parents.” – Jane D. Hull

“There’s always the syndrome of the parent-child relationship: when someone has known you since you were very young, it doesn’t matter how much more independent, how much older or more mature you get – there is still that element, the dynamic of the relationship that is very hard to transform successfully.” – Helene Grimaud

“Of course, parents are the most important people in a child’s life.” – Hillary Clinton

“Parents can only give good advice or put them on the right paths, but the final forming of a person’s character lies in their own hands.” – Anne Frank

“There is no such thing as a perfect parent. So just be a real one.” – Sue Atkins

“Parenthood…It’s about guiding the next generation and forgiving the last.” – Peter Krause

“No one is ever quite ready; everyone is always caught off guard. Parenthood chooses you. And you open your eyes, look at what you’ve got, say “Oh, my gosh,” and recognize that of all the balls there ever were, this is the one you should not drop. It’s not a question of choice.” – Marisa de los Santos

“While we try to teach our children all about life, our children teach us what life is all about.” – Angela Schwindt

“There is nothing more precious to a parent than a child, and nothing more important to our future than the safety of all our children.” – Bill Clinton

“But now, being a parent, I go home and see my son, and I forget about any mistake I ever made or the reason I’m upset. I get home, and my son is smiling, or he comes running to me. It has just made me grow as an individual and grow as a man.” – LeBron James

“The joys of parents are secret, and so are their grieves and fears: they cannot utter the one, nor will they utter the other.” – Francis Bacon

“There really are places in the heart you don’t even know exist until you love a child.” – Anne Lamott

“You learn so much about yourself from being a parent, and you care more about the world you are raising your kids in.” – Kim Kardashian

“Perhaps it takes courage to raise children.” – John Steinbeck

Funny Quotes About Parenting

“My biggest parenting conundrum: why is it so hard to put someone who is already sleepy to sleep.” – Chrissy Teigen

“It just occurred to me that the majority of my diet is made up of the foods that my kid didn’t finish.” – Carrie Underwood

“You’re just like a human napkin for kids, like, they just wipe their face on you and stuff.” – Tina Fey

“‘I don’t think so Mommy!’ is what my child said after, ‘Can you please pick up the popcorn you threw all over?’” – Anna Faris

“Being a father is the single greatest feeling on Earth. Not including those wonderful years I spent without a child, of course.” – Ryan Reynolds

“Parenting is one of the best management training programs there is.” – Irene Rosenfeld

“A perfect parent is a person with excellent child-rearing theories and no actual children.” – Dave Barry

“I take my children everywhere, but they always find their way back home.” – Robert Orben

“Having an infant son alerts me to the fact that every man, at one point, has peed on his own face.” – Olivia Wilde

“Ah, babies! They’re more than just adorable little creatures on whom you can blame your farts.” – Tina Fey

“You will always be your child’s favorite toy.” – Vicki Lansky

“I don’t know what’s more exhausting about parenting: the getting up early or acting like you know what you’re doing.” – Jim Gaffigan

“Everybody knows how to raise children, except the people who have them.” – P. J. O’Rourke

“If you have never been hated by your child, you have never been a parent.” – Bette Davis

“First your parents, they give you your life, but then they try to give you their life.” – Chuck Palahniuk

“That’s what children are for—that their parents may not be bored.” – Ivan Turgenev

“Having children is like living in a frat house– nobody sleeps, everything’s broken, and there’s a lot of throwing up.” – Ray Romano

“A 2-year-old is kind of like having a blender, but you don’t have a top for it.” – Jerry Seinfeld

“I thought I’d never be the annoying person, but as soon as Winnie was born, I was showing iPhone snaps to a cab driver.” – Jimmy Fallon

“If your kids are giving you a headache, follow the directions on the aspirin bottle, especially the part that says, “keep away from children”.” – Susan Savannah

“Cleaning your house while your kids are still growing up is like shoveling the sidewalk before it stops snowing.” – Phyllis Diller

“The quickest way for a parent to get a child’s attention is to sit down and look comfortable.” – Lane Olinghouse

“No one knows his true character until he has run out of gas, purchased something on the installment plan, and raised an adolescent.” – Marcelene Cox

“Before I got married, I had six theories about raising children; now, I have six children and no theories.” – John Wilmot

“Having a child is like getting a tattoo … on your face. You better be committed.” – Elizabeth Gilbert

“When your children are teenagers, it’s important to have a dog so that someone in the house is happy to see you.” – Nora Ephron

“The best way to keep children at home is to make the home atmosphere pleasant and let the air out of the tires.” – Dorothy Parker 

“All of us have moments in our lives that test our courage. Taking children into a house with a white carpet is one of them.” – Erma Bombeck

Parenting Advice for New Parents

“The Golden Rule of Parenting is: do unto your children as you wish your parents had done unto you!” – Louise Hart

“Parents are not perfect, nor are they saints. Dads and moms make mistakes all the time. How you handle these situations will be an important life lesson for your children.” – Bethany Bridges

“Good parents hardly parent. They let their kids learn, fail, and grow without interference.” – Trevor Carss

“As your kids grow, they may forget what you said, but won’t forget how you made them feel.” – Kevin Heath

“ The best inheritance a parent can give his children is a few minutes of his time each day.” – O. A. Battista

“With every word we utter, with every action we take, we know our kids are watching us.” – Michelle Obama

“A child who is allowed to be disrespectful to his parents will not have true respect for anyone.” – Billy Graham

“The greatest gift a parent can give a child is self-confidence.” – Stewart Stafford

“Parents need to fill a child’s bucket of self-esteem so high that the rest of the world can’t poke enough holes to drain it dry.” – Alvin Price

“If the day ever came when we were able to accept ourselves and our children exactly as we and they are, then, I believe, we would have come very close to an ultimate understanding of what ‘good’ parenting means.” – Fred Rogers

“You have a lifetime to work, but children are only young once.” – Polish Proverb

“One hundred years from now, it won’t matter what your bank account was, the sort of house you lived in, or the kind of car you drove, but the world may be different because you were important in the life of a child.” – Forest E. Witcraft

“Affirming words from moms and dads are like light switches. Speak a word of affirmation at the right moment in a child’s life, and it’s like lighting up a whole roomful of possibilities.” – Gary Smalley

“The most important thing that parents can teach their children is how to get along without them.” – Frank A. Clark

“Children are apt to live up to what you believe of them.” – Lady Bird Johnson

“Children harbor a great many doubts and sorrows that could be eased by a loving hug from a parent.” – Richelle E. Goodrich

“The affection of parents makes infants feel safe in this dangerous world, and gives them boldness in experimentation and in exploration of their environments.” – Bertrand Russell

“Don’t worry that children never listen to you; worry that they are always watching you.” – Robert Fulghum

“Respect the child. Be not too much his parent. Trespass not on his solitude.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

“The daily choices we make as parents to filter what enters our children’s impressionable hearts and minds will go a long way in determining who our children become.” – Mark J. Musser

“We may not be able to prepare the future for our children, but we can at least prepare our children for the future.” – Franklin D. Roosevelt

“I don’t think it matters how many parents you’ve got, as long as those who are around make their presence a good one.” – Elizabeth Wurtzel

“There is no school equal to a decent home and no teacher equal to a virtuous parent.” – Mahatma Gandhi

“Always kiss your children goodnight – even if they’re already asleep.” – H. Jackson Brown, Jr.

“You have to love your children unselfishly. That is hard. But it is the only way.” – Barbara Bush

“Each day of our lives, we make deposits in the memory banks of our children.” – Charles R. Swindoll

“Your kids require you most of all, to love them for who they are, not to spend your whole time trying to correct them.” – Bill Ayers

“It is better to bind your children to you by a feeling of respect and by gentleness than by fear.” – Terence

“Children are just different from one another, especially in temperament. Some are shy, others bold; some active, some quiet; some confident, others less so. Respect for individual differences is, in my view, the cornerstone of good parent-child relationships.” – Sandra Scarr

“The best way to give advice to your children is to find out what they want and then advise them to do it.” – Harry S. Truman

“Children do learn what they live. Then they grow up to live what they’ve learned.” – Dorothy Nolte

“The best kind of parent you can be is to lead by example.” – Drew Barrymore

“What’s done to children, they will do to society.” – Karl Menninger

“Children are educated by what the grown-up is and not by his talk.” – Carl Jung

“Your children vividly remember every unkind thing you ever did to them, plus a few you really didn’t.” – Mignon McLaughlin

“Nurturing never happens in a rush.” – Emma Scheib

“Don’t let yourself become so concerned with raising a good kid that you forget you already have one.” – Glennon Melton

Love Quotes About Family & Loving Parents

“Grandparents, like heroes, are as necessary to a child’s growth as vitamins.” – Joyce Allston

“What children need most are the essentials that grandparents provide in abundance. They give unconditional love, kindness, patience, humor, comfort, lessons in life. And, most importantly, cookies.” – Rudy Giuliani

“You don’t choose your family. They are God’s gift to you, as you are to them.” – Desmond Tutu

“If I call you a friend, I mean it. You are now on par with being a family member.” – Leah Remini

“Nobody can do for little children what grandparents do. Grandparents sort of sprinkle stardust over the lives of little children.” – Alex Haley

“Family is the most important thing in the world.” – Princess Diana

“Everyone needs a house to live in, but a supportive family is what builds a home.” – Anthony Liccione

“Some of us can live without a society but not without a family.” – Amit Kalantri

Loving Father Quotes

“Fathers provide not only support but also encouragement.” – Catherine Pulsifer

“The most important influence in my childhood was my father.” – DeForest Kelley

“The heart of a father is the masterpiece of nature.” – Prevost Abbe

“Fathering is not something perfect men do, but something that perfects the man.” – Frank Pittman

Quotes About a Mother’s Love

“Mother’s love is peace. It need not be acquired; it need not be deserved.” – Erich Fromm

“When you look into your mother’s eyes, you know that is the purest love you can find on this earth.” – Mitch Albom

“Love as powerful as your mother’s for you leaves its own mark. To have been loved so deeply… will give us some protection forever.” – J.K. Rowling

“A mother’s love is patient and forgiving when all others are forsaking; it never fails or falters, even though the heart is breaking.” – Helen Rice

“There’s nothing like your mother’s sympathetic voice to make you want to burst into tears.” – Sophie Kinsella

“All that I am, or hope to be, I owe to my mother.” – Abraham Lincoln

“A mother understands what a child does not say.” – Jewish Proverb

“She was our mother and belonged to us.” – Maya Angelou

“Don’t use the sharpness of your tongue on the mother who taught you to speak.” – Ali Ibn Abi Talib

“A mother’s arms are made of tenderness, and children sleep soundly in them.” – Victor Hugo

“Sometimes, the strength of motherhood is greater than natural laws.” – Barbara Kingsolver

“A father’s goodness is higher than the mountain, a mother’s goodness deeper than the sea.” – Japanese Proverb

“No matter your age, you will always need your mom.” – Unknown

“Motherhood is the greatest thing and the hardest thing.” – Ricki Lake

“Becoming a mom to me means that you have accepted that for the next 16 years of your life, you will have a sticky purse.” – Nia Vardalos

“A mother is a person who is seeing there are only four pieces of pie for five people, promptly announces she never did care for pie.” – Tenneva Jordan

“The heart of a mother is a deep abyss at the bottom of which you will always find forgiveness.” – Honore de Balzac

Loving Daughter Quotes

“On our 6 a.m. walk, my daughter asked where the moon goes each morning. I let her know it’s in heaven, visiting Daddy’s freedom.” – Ryan Reynolds

“To me, luxury is to be at home with my daughter, and the occasional massage doesn’t hurt.” – Olivia Newton-John

“A mother and daughter’s love is never separated.” – Viola Shipman

Read more Reference .

About the author

Katee Fletcher

Katee’s passion for writing and fascination for language has forever guided her path in life.

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12 Parenting Quotes by Famous Writers

There is so much advice on parenting. Everyone has their own ideas and methods, and then the experts weigh in and shake up the apple cart. Fear sets in as you as a parent wonder if you are sending your child straight to years on a therapists couch to unravel their childhood.

The tool of writing is so helpful for a parent to make sense of what you as the parent think is best for you, best for your child.  You don’t have to be a writer to take a piece of paper and write out what you think about what kind of life and energy you want to surround your child with.

Here are some thoughts on parenting by famous writers. They have spent lots of time putting their thoughts onto the page and what they say is truly what they have taken the time to think about and process through the tool of writing.

“There is no single effort more radical in its potential for saving the world than a transformation of the way we raise our children.”  Marianne Williamson

As a thought leader on love, spirituality, politics and being a woman, Marianne reminds us that to change the world the place to start is with our children.

“If you bungle raising your children, I don’t think whatever else you do matters very much.” Jacqueline Kennedy

  The former first lady of the United States raised many children and definitely believed in the importance of family.

“Parents can only give good advice or put them on the right paths, but the final forming of a person’s character lies in their own hands.” Anne Frank

Although she did not have children, Holocaust victim Anne Frank had her ideas about parenting. She saw the struggles of her family and how her parents could not guarantee her life path, and realized that what they did pass onto her was morals and wisdom. And it was really up to the children to use them in their own way.

“The best way to make children good is to make them happy.” Oscar Wilde

When a child feels like it’s all about discipline and production, neglected or misunderstood, they act out. The Irish writer didn’t have his own children, but he realized from his own observations that children who behave the best tend to be the happiest.

“It is time for parents to teach young people that in diversity there is beauty and there is strength.” Maya Angelou

Maya Angelou reminds us that the attitudes that children have about race, religion and sexuality come from the home.  She encourages parents to teach children about diversity and to celebrate it.

“I would have given anything to keep her little. They outgrow us so much faster than we outgrow them.” Jodi Picoult

At times, we as parents think we have all the time in world to enjoy our kids when they’re little. Jodi reminds us otherwise, to be in the moment with your children.

“There are only two lasting bequeaths we can hope to give our children. One of these is roots the other wings.”  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

This German writer summed up what he thought all children need, roots and wings. When a child feels they have both they can soar and be grounded simultaneously.

“Don’t worry that children never listen to you: worry that they are always watching you.” Robert Fulghum

Robert wrote All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten . As a keen observer of children, he realized how much children are watching you. In a way this makes it easier; we don’t have to preach, only practice.

“What it’s like to be a parent: It’s one of the hardest things you’ll ever do but in exchange it teaches you the meaning of unconditional love.” Nicholas Sparks

As a writer of many romance novels that were turned into romantic movies like The Notebook, he says that the ultimate unconditional love is taught to us by our children. We usually look to romantic partners to teach this to us, to give this to us, and yet it’s the children that know it best.

“I don’t remember who said this, but there really are places in the heart you don’t even know exist until you love a child.” Anne Lamott

Anne writes about her own addictions, her life troubles and where she found her heart is in her son. Looking externally for pieces of her heart came full circle when her child was born.

“Perhaps it takes courage to raise children.” John Steinbeck

He was a Nobel Prize winner, husband to 3 wives yet had no children. This deep thinker and writer had the realization that what it takes to raise children was courage. Parents sometimes forget how courageous they are when raising their children.

“I am prouder of my years as a single mother than of any other time of my life.” J.K. Rowling

As the author of the Harry Potter books, she picked the time as a parent as the highlight, the proudest time of her life. No matter what success we wish and long for, and work towards, the biggest and proudest accomplishment may just be in the next bedroom, waiting for our love and devotion to just being their parent.

Be willing to say to those in your charge, “I don’t know.”“Content with an ordinary life, you can show all people the way back to their own true nature.” Being open to the guidance of your own true nature will free others to do the same. And “when they know they do not know, people can find their own way.” Parenting shouldn’t mean imposing rules or impressing others with your supposed intelligence and superiority. Refuse to convey superiority.”  Wayne Dyer

You would think that Dr. Dyer, father of 8, would have the ‘know it all’ about parenting as a father and self help guru. Yet what he says is that its important for you to tell your children  that you don’t know. And to give the child the power to find their own way sometimes.

So there you have the wisdom and writing of famous writers about parenting. This is all food for thought to take in whatever resonates with you. At the end, it’s up to you to take pen to paper and write down what YOU think. Write your own parenting rules. You know yourself and your children better than anyone else.

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• School Education /

Essay on Parents: Free Samples for School Students

• Updated on  
• Nov 6, 2023

Robert Brault once said, ‘A parent’s love is whole no matter how many times divided.’ Our parents mean everything to us. From birth to the day we become financially independent, our parents have always been there for us, formulate our thoughts and make or change the decisions in our lives. Parents play a crucial role in a child’s emotional, social, intellectual, and physical development. We celebrate important days like Mother’s Day and Father’s Day to honour and respect our parents. No words can describe the efforts and the hardships they go through. Therefore, today we will be providing you with an essay on parents to help you understand their importance in our lives and their role in shaping our future.

Table of Contents

• 1 Essay on Parents in 100 Words
• 2 Essay on Parents in 200 Words
• 3 Essay on Parents in 300 Words

Also Read: Parental Pressure: Care But Not Too Much

Essay on Parents in 100 Words

Also Read: Importance of Education in Our Life

Essay on Parents in 200 Words

Also Read: National Parent’s Day 2023

Essay on Parents in 300 Words

Also Read: How to Prepare for UPSC in 6 Months?

Ans: It’s very easy to write an essay on parents, all you need to do is highlight every aspect of your life where your parents have supported you. You can start by mentioning your early school days when you were having difficulties with your classmates or teacher, and how beautifully your parents helped you. Real-life examples will give value to your essay as it will portray the emotional bond between you and your parents.

Ans: Mere words cannot describe the importance of parents in our lives, as they always try to do their best. Our parents offer us the life which they ever dreamed of so that we can have a flourishing future. They are the primary source of moral guidance for us. They impart values, ethics, and principles that shape our understanding of right and wrong, contributing to the development of a strong moral compass.

Ans: Here are 5 lines on parents: Parents are the guiding lights that illuminate the path of a child’s life; They provide unconditional love, which forms the bedrock of our emotional well-being; Through their nurturing presence, parents provide a sense of security and stability; They serve as role models, imparting values and morals that shape our character; Parents are the first teachers, introducing us the wonders of the world.

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Shiva Tyagi

With an experience of over a year, I've developed a passion for writing blogs on wide range of topics. I am mostly inspired from topics related to social and environmental fields, where you come up with a positive outcome.

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15 Beautiful Quotes Every Parent Needs to Hear

Parenting is challenging, but it’s the most rewarding job you’ll ever do. As you help your children grow and develop into good people, you’ll see things from an entirely new perspective. Many beautiful quotes can help parents remember how fulfilling the journey can be.

Sometimes, you might forget how great of a parent you are. You’ll make mistakes and question yourself once in a while, and that is okay. These beautiful quotes can help reaffirm that you don’t need to be perfect to be a great parent.

Beautiful Quotes for Parents

These beautiful quotes about parenting can help you on calm days and ones that seem out of control. No matter what stage of life you are in, every parent needs to hear these positive messages. If any of them resonate with you, consider writing the beautiful quotes down and referencing them often.

2. “I wholeheartedly believe that when we are fully engaged in parenting regardless of how imperfect, vulnerable, and messy it is, we are creating something sacred.” – Brene Brown

These beautiful quotes serve as a great reminder–you don’t have to be a perfect parent, but you have to be there for the hard times just as much as the good ones. As Dweck explains, if you are present and engaged as a parent, you create a sacred bond that can’t break. Parenting is imperfect and unpredictable, but it’s more special than anything else.

3. “Ideas and values are most powerfully communicated when they are embedded into family life, rooted in the being of the parents. Regardless of what we think we’re teaching, we teach what we are.” – Nathaniel Branden

By practicing the values you try to teach, your children will pick up on that, too. While this isn’t always a perfect method, showing that you follow what you teach will help embed it into your family life.

Take Things in Stride by Remembering These Beautiful Quotes

As you spend time with your kids, don’t stress about anything else. Push away thoughts on the past and future because living in the moment is more important. When you embrace the present, you can create a beautiful life that your children remember forever.

While it might be easy to do things for your kids, you should let them do it themselves. When you teach children to do something for themselves, you also teach them to be successful.

6. “Don’t compare your child to others. There is no comparison between the sun and the moon. They shine when it’s their time.” – Unknown

Remember this beautiful quote the next time your child isn’t ready for something that someone else is. It’ll happen for your child when it’s their time.

Shape Your Children Today for a Better Tomorrow

When you want something to grow and flourish, care for it nourishingly. Raising your voice won’t help your child, but using the right words will. Remember this quote the next time you find yourself angry or upset with your child.

Each person develops their life as they go along. As your children use what is inside them to move along their journey, you’ll want them to have the best chances. Make sure that you help your child develop what they have into positive influences for their lives and those around them.

When you parent your children, go with your gut and follow your instincts as you make decisions. Good parents tend to have positive instincts, as Spock explains, so don’t doubt yourself or your parenting abilities. You know your child better than anyone else does, so you know what is best for them.

Kids see and interpret things differently than adults do. They also find joy in the little things in life. And these beautiful quotes remind all parents about the beauty around them. Plus, as children learn and grow, parents do, too.

Be a Great Role Model

11. “The point of parenting isn’t to have all the answers before we start out but instead to figure it out on the go as our children grow, because as they do, so will we.” – Bridgett Miller

Learn to embrace this part of parenting because you’re growing alongside your child. Use the inspiring wisdom you gain each day to guide you along your journey.

No one is perfect, even if they pretend to be. Don’t hide your flaws because everyone has them. Instead, be a genuine person by admitting your mistakes and trying your best.

Parents tend to blame outside influences for their child’s behavior, but it’s wise to look closer to home for the source. Your children model your words, movements, and actions. Since kids aren’t fully developed, their model of your behavior might look different than your actual behavior.

14. “While we try to teach our children about life, our children end up teaching us what life is all about.” – Angela Schwindt

This beautiful quote reminds you that you’re never too old to play with your kids. You might not be a child anymore, but you can still engage with your child, doing things they love.

Final Thoughts on Beautiful Quotes Every Parent Needs to Hear

Use beautiful quotes for parents to help remind you that you don’t have to be perfect. Your child loves you and models your behavior because they think you are great. Keep these positive quotes in mind, and you’ll remember what a blessing this journey is.

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• My Parents Essay

500 Words Essay On My Parents

We entered this world because of our parents. It is our parents who have given us life and we must learn to be pleased with it. I am grateful to my parents for everything they do for me. Through my parents essay, I wish to convey how valuable they are to me and how much I respect and admire them.

My Strength My Parents Essay

My parents are my strength who support me at every stage of life. I cannot imagine my life without them. My parents are like a guiding light who take me to the right path whenever I get lost.

My mother is a homemaker and she is the strongest woman I know. She helps me with my work and feeds me delicious foods . She was a teacher but left the job to take care of her children.

My mother makes many sacrifices for us that we are not even aware of. She always takes care of us and puts us before herself. She never wakes up late. Moreover, she is like a glue that binds us together as a family.

Parents are the strength and support system of their children. They carry with them so many responsibilities yet they never show it. We must be thankful to have parents in our lives as not everyone is lucky to have them.

Get the huge list of more than 500 Essay Topics and Ideas

While my mother is always working at home, my father is the one who works outside. He is a kind human who always helps out my mother whenever he can. He is a loving man who helps out the needy too.

My father is a social person who interacts with our neighbours too. Moreover, he is an expert at maintaining his relationship with our relatives. My father works as a businessman and does a lot of hard work.

Even though he is a busy man, he always finds time for us. We spend our off days going to picnics or dinners. I admire my father for doing so much for us without any complaints.

He is a popular man in society as he is always there to help others. Whoever asks for his help, my father always helps them out. Therefore, he is a well-known man and a loving father whom I look up to.

Conclusion of My Parents Essay

I love both my parents with all my heart. They are kind people who have taught their children to be the same. Moreover, even when they have arguments, they always make up without letting it affect us. I aspire to become like my parents and achieve success in life with their blessings.

FAQ of My Parents Essay

Question 1: Why parents are important in our life?

Answer 1: Parents are the most precious gifts anyone can get. However, as not everyone has them, we must consider ourselves lucky if we do. They are the strength and support system of children and help them out always. Moreover, the parents train the children to overcome challenges and make the best decision for us.

Question 2: What do parents mean to us?

Answer 2: Parents mean different things to different people. To most of us, they are our source of happiness and protection. They are the ones who are the closest to us and understand our needs without having to say them out loud. Similarly, they love us unconditionally for who we are without any ifs and buts.

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When I was a kid, I moved every few months. Now that I'm a parent, I focus on creating stability for my family.

• I moved frequently while I was growing up, and it was difficult for me to feel grounded.
• When I became a parent, I knew I wanted my kids to have more stability than I did.
• We have routines and a sense of family identity, though I do leave room for some spontaneity, too.

I grew up moving often, attending at least two schools every year of my childhood until my junior year. My record was four different schools in eighth grade. There weren't any specific reasons for most of the moves; we weren't a military family or moving due to work. My mom was just a bit flighty and had a hard time settling down anywhere, so she picked us up and left often. This made it incredibly hard to maintain friends or consistency in any area of my life.

I picked up the trumpet only to leave it behind when the next school didn't have classes. I learned to tolerate running cross country in the Illinois winter to trade it for Miami's humidity. Thanks to my time in Tennessee and Georgia, my accent constantly shifted from a Southern drawl to a neutral one, which allowed me to fit in outside the Southern states.

While these experiences instilled some qualities in me that I'm grateful for, such as ease in making friends and my love of experiencing new places, for me, the benefits didn't outweigh the negatives.

I had a hard time developing a sense of self or feeling grounded

Moving so often taught me to be a chameleon. I didn't spend time trying to figure out what I liked. Instead, I figured out what would make me the most acceptable version of myself to the most new people. I learned fairly early on that making friends was a pointless endeavor. I'd find myself with a best friend just before another move was announced. And then I'd find myself in a new town , friendless, and starting over again.

These experiences made it hard for me to form a strong sense of self or feel grounded. The coping mechanisms and behaviors I picked up to help me through this time, like being quick to let go of friendships or not feeling connected to any one place, served me well for childhood but ultimately became unhelpful when I started to settle into life as an adult. It took me a long time to unlearn those lessons and to let people into my life, and these weren't traits I wanted to cultivate in my kids.

As a parent, I focus on creating routines and stability

When I became a parent, I read about the benefits of routines for children and the security that familiarity provides. I prioritized creating a predictable routine for sleep and eating schedules during my kids' infancy and toddlerhood.

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As they entered early childhood, we established clear rules around bedtimes, screen time, and how much candy is appropriate to eat, among other things. We have also stayed in the house we bought when I was pregnant with our first child nearly 13 years ago.

As they have grown, we have built family rituals such as Friday Family Night, where we take turns deciding what to do as a group. The only rule is that you cannot complain about the choice of the week, or you will lose your next turn to pick.

We have an advent calendar countdown to Christmas, an Easter party that friends near and far attend, and birthday traditions that span the entire day. These all add another layer of predictability to their lives and give our kids a sense of family identity and belonging. Plus, they are just plain fun.

I know I can't protect my kids from change, nor would I want to. But I hope that the scaffolding of predictable routines and rituals as a foundation in their lives will give them the support they need to handle big changes when they arise.

So far, such as when we lost their grandmother , our family dog died, or we had to figure out how to fly home from Amsterdam in mid-March of 2020 amid the start of the pandemic, it seems to have helped them have the skills they need to manage tough feelings around big events.

I leave room for some spontaneity, too

I don't want my kids to be too routine-driven, though, either, as I understand the value of flexibility and spontaneity. So, I try to give them opportunities to get out of their comfort zones , too. Whether that is new foods, travel, or just wiggle room in our usual rules and schedule, I want them to see potential joy in unknowns.

I just don't want those things to come at the expense of their ability to feel that there is a place where they belong that belongs to them. As a parent, I know I can't be perfect. But I can be predictable and give them a dependable home they can return to at any point.

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National Parent's Day: Significance, quotes and messages

Honouring our parents on parents' day highlights the priceless influence they have on our lives and the love and support they provide. it gives you a chance to thank them and honour their commitment and sacrifices. this unique day deepens the ties that bind families together and increases gratitude for the leadership and nurturing that parents give..

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“The greatest gift a parent can give a child is unconditional love. As a child wanders and strays, finding his bearings, he needs a sense of absolute love from a parent. There’s nothing wrong with tough love, as long as the love is unconditional.” - George W. Bush

“My parents are my backbone. Still are. They’re the only group that will support you if you score zero, or you score 40.” - Kobe Bryant

“In life’s intricate maze, your love has been my guide, leading me to the right path always.”

“Your love has been my shelter in life’s stormy weather. I celebrate you, dear parents.”

I love the way you always know how to make me feel better when I am down. Thank you for being the best parents in the world.

Thank you for all the sacrifices you have made for me. I love you both very much. Happy Parent’s Day.

100 A-Plus Back-To-School Quotes for Students and Teachers

The return to class calls for a little pep rally!

Back to School Quotes for Teachers

Back to school quotes for the first day of school, funny back to school quotes.

All good things must come to an end, and we’re sorry to report that those long summer days spent lounging at the pool must finally give way to autumnal days studying at school. And while writing an essay or studying for a calculus test is way less fun than, say, chilling with friends in the deep end, there are quite a few perks that come with heading back to the classroom. Think of all the cool school supplies you get to stock up on—for our money, there are few things finer than a Pink Pearl eraser—as well as an assortment of new clothes that are sure to show off the highlights and tan you got at the aforementioned pool.

Still feeling a little sad about getting down to business and cracking open those books? That’s understandable. But there’s something to be said about getting smarter. In fact, there are a whole lot of famous people ranging from Michelle Obama and the Dalai Lama to Oprah and Amy Poehler who have a whole lot to say on the topic. Take a gander, and we bet that their wise words will make you feel a little more excited about all the edification and enlightenment that will happen this year.

Back to School Quotes for Students

• “For there is always light. If only we’re brave enough to see it. If only we’re brave enough to be it.” —Amanda Gorman
• “You learn something new every day if you pay attention.” —Ray LeBlond
• “The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it. It’s that we aim too low and reach it.” —Michelangelo
• “A sense of curiosity is nature’s original education.” —Smiley Blanton
• “Hold yourself responsible for a higher standard than anybody else expects of you. Never excuse yourself. Never pity yourself. Be a hard master to yourself and be lenient to everybody else.” —Henry Ward Beecher
• “If you don’t understand, ask questions. If you’re uncomfortable about asking questions, say you are uncomfortable about asking questions and then ask anyway.” —Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
• “You have to stay in school. You have to. You have to go to college. You have to get your degree. Because that’s the one thing people can’t take away from you is your education. And it is worth the investment.” —Michelle Obama
• “You must do the things you think you cannot do.” —Eleanor Roosevelt
• “Belonging starts with self-acceptance… Believing that you’re enough is what gives you the courage to be authentic, vulnerable, imperfect.” —Brene Brown
• “Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.” —Arthur Ashe
• “I’ve always loved the first day of school better than the last day of school. Firsts are best because they are beginnings.” —Jenny Han
• “Whether you think you can or think you can’t, you’re right.” —Henry Ford
• “Your education is a dress rehearsal for a life that is yours to lead.” —Nora Ephron
• “There may be people that have more talent than you, but there is no excuse for anyone to work harder than you do.” —Derek Jeter
• “A no. 2 pencil and a dream can take you anywhere.” —Joyce Meyer
• “Today a reader, tomorrow a leader.” —Margaret Fuller
• “The beautiful thing about learning is that no one can take it away from you.” —B.B. King
• “Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.” —Thomas Huxley
• “It is never too late to be what you might have been.” —George Eliot
• “Nothing is impossible. The word itself says, 'I’m possible.'" —Audrey Hepburn
• “You don’t have to be great to start, but you do have to start to be great.” —Zig Ziglar
• “Success is the sum of small efforts, repeated day in and day out.” —Robert Collier
• “The only person who is educated is the one who has learned how to learn… and change.” –Carl Roger

• “When educating the minds of our youth, we must not forget to educate their hearts.” —Dalai Lama
• “When we empower girls hungry for education, we cultivate women who are emboldened to effect change within their communities and globally.” —Meghan Markle, The Duchess of Sussex
• “Enthusiasm is common. Endurance is rare.” —Angela Duckworth
• “Success is no accident. It is hard work, perseverance, learning, studying, sacrifice, and most of all, love of what you are doing or learning to do.” —Pelé
• “Education doesn’t make us smarter. It makes us whole.” —Jill Biden
• “In a global economy, where the most valuable skill you can sell is your knowledge, a good education is no longer just a pathway to opportunity, it is a prerequisite.” —Barak Obama
• “Education is simply the soul of a society as it passes from one generation to another.” —G.K. Chesterton
• “You can’t do it alone. Be open to collaboration. Find a group of people who challenge and inspire you. Spend a lot of time with them, and it will change your life.”— Amy Poehler
• “Education is the passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to those who prepare for it today.” —Malcolm X
• “The greatest gifts we can give our children are the roots of responsibility and the wings of independence.” —Maria Montessori
• “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” —Nelson Mandela
• “Better than a thousand days of diligent study is one day with a great teacher.” —Japanese Proverb
• “If you have to put someone on a pedestal, put teachers. They are society’s heroes.” —Guy Kawasaki
• “The duties of a teacher are neither few nor small, but they elevate the mind and give energy to the character.” —Dorthea Dix
• “Education is not the learning of many facts, but the training of the mind to think.” —Albert Einstein
• “Let us remember: One book, one pen, one child, and one teacher can change the world.” —Malala Yousafzai
• “Teachers have three loves: love of learning, love of learners, and the love of bringing the first two loves together.” —Scott Hayden
• “Teaching is the greatest act of optimism.” —Colleen Wilcox
• “If your plan is for one year plant rice. If your plan is for 10 years, plant trees. If your plan is for 100 years, educate children.” —Confucius
• “There is more treasure in books than in all the pirates’ loot on Treasure Island and best of all, you can enjoy these riches every day of your life.” —Walt Disney
• “Children are apt to live up to what you believe of them.” —Lady Bird Johnson
• “Education is the difference between wishing you could help other people and being able to help them.” —Russell M. Nelson
• “Education is when you read the fine print. Experience is what you get if you don’t.” —Lydia Child
• “Everything is a learning process. Any time you fall over, it’s just teaching you to stand the next time.” —Joel Edgerton
• “You cannot dream of becoming something you do not know about. You have to learn to dream big. Education exposes you to what the world has to offer, to the possibilities open to you.” —Sonia Sotomayor
• “What we learn with pleasure, we never forget.” —Alfred Mercier
• “Think about every problem, every challenge we face. The solution starts with education.” —George H.W. Bush
• “The great aim of education is not knowledge but action.” —Herbert Spencer
• “Education is not preparation for life; education is life itself.” —John Dewey
• “Intelligence plus character—that is the true goal of education.” —Martin Luther King Jr.
• “Education’s purpose is to replace an empty mind with an open one.” —Malcolm Forbes
• “The dream begins, most of the time, with a teacher who believes in you, who tugs and pushes and leads you on to the next plateau, sometimes poking you with a sharp stick called ‘truth.’” —Dan Rather
• “Children must be taught how to think, not what to think.” —Margaret Mead
• “Nothing prevents boredom like a good book.” —Dave Pilkey
• “The road to freedom—here and everywhere on earth—begins in the classroom.” —Hubert Humphrey
• “Too often we give children answers to remember rather than problems to solve.” —Roger Lewin
• “Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn.” —Benjamin Franklin
• “Education is a right, not a privilege; it is an opportunity, not an entitlement.” —Arne Duncan
• “Every student can learn, just not on the same day or in the same way.” —George Evans
• “The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity.” —Dorothy Parker
• “I like a teacher who gives you something to take home to think about besides homework.” —Lily Tomlin
• “The beginning is the most important part of the work.” —Plato
• “This is a new year. A new beginning. And things will change.” —Taylor Swift
• “With every book, you go back to school. You become a student. You become an investigative reporter. You spend a little time learning what it’s like to live in someone else’s shoes.” —John Irving
• “Education is the key to unlocking the world, a passport of freedom.” —Oprah Winfrey
• “If it doesn’t challenge you, it doesn’t change you.” —Fred DeVito
• “If you fail to prepare, you’re prepared to fail.” —Mark Spitz
• “You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream.” —C.S. Lewis
• “Motivation is what gets you started. Habit is what keeps you going.” —Jim Ryun
• “Progress not perfection.” —Kimberly Snyder
• “You miss 100% of the shots you never take.” —Wayne Gretzky
• “You have to expect things of yourself before you can do them.” —Michael Jordan
• “The meaning of life is to find your gift. The purpose of life is to give it away.” —Pablo Picasso
• “A well-educated mind will always have more answers than questions.” —Helen Keller
• “The most important day of a person’s education is the first day of school, not graduation day.” —Harry Wong
• “School is a building, which has four walls with tomorrow inside.” —Lon Watters
• “Information may be free; an education is priceless.” —Marie Forleo
• “A new school year means new beginnings, new adventures, new friendships, and new challenges. The slate is clean and anything can happen.” —Denise Witmer
• “Do not wait until the conditions are perfect to begin. Beginning makes the conditions perfect.” —Alan Cohen
• “Learn as much as you can while you are young since life becomes too busy later.” —Dana Stewart Scott
• “All the world is a laboratory to the inquiring mind.” —Martin H. Fischer
• “The capacity to learn is a gift; the ability to learn is a skill; the willingness to learn is a choice.” —Brian Herbert

• “The only place where success comes before work is in the dictionary.” —Vidal Sassoon
• “You can never be overdressed or overeducated.” —Oscar Wilde
• “The difference between try and triumph is a little umph.” —Marvin Phillips
• “Some students drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.” —E.C. McKenzie
• “Dreams come a size too big so that we can grow into them.” —Josie Bisset
• “We all learn by experience, but some of us have to go to summer school.” —Peter De Vries
• “If opportunity doesn’t knock, build a door.” —Milton Berle
• “No one is perfect. That’s why pencils have erasers.” —Wolfgang Riebe
• “You have brains in your head. You have feet on your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose.” —Dr. Seuss
• “Minds are like a parachutes. They only function when they are open.” James Dewar
• “It’s one of my favorite seasons of the year: Back to School.” —Dana Perino
• “To be good is noble, but to teach others how to be good is nobler—and less trouble.” —Mark Twain
• “Be curious, not cool.” —Ken Burns
• “Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing it’s stupid.” —Albert Einstein
• “Work hard, nap hard.” —Demi Lovato

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What Adults Lost When Kids Stopped Playing in the Street

In many ways, a world built for cars has made life so much harder for grown-ups.

Produced by ElevenLabs and News Over Audio (NOA) using AI narration.

This article was featured in the One Story to Read Today newsletter. Sign up for it here .

I n the summer of 2009, Amy Rose and Alice Ferguson, two mothers living on Greville Road in Bristol, a midsize city in southwest England, found themselves in a strange predicament: They saw entirely too much of their kids. “We were going, like, Why are they here? ” Rose told me. “ Why aren’t they outside? ” The friends decided to run an experiment. They applied to shut their quarter-mile road to traffic for two hours after school on a June afternoon—not for a party or an event but just to let the children who lived there play. Intentionally, they didn’t prepare games or activities, Rose told me, as it would have defeated the purpose of the inquiry: “With time, space, and permission, what happens?”

The results were breathtaking. The dozens of kids who showed up had no problem finding things to do. One little girl cycled up and down the street “3,000 times,” Rose recalled. “She was totally blissed out.” Suddenly, the modern approach to children’s play, in which parents shuttle their kids to playgrounds or other structured activities, seemed both needlessly extravagant and wholly insufficient. Kids didn’t need special equipment or lessons; they just needed to be less reliant on their time-strapped parents to get outside.

The experiment also produced some unexpected results. As children poured into the street, some ran into classmates, only just then realizing that they were neighbors. Soon it became clear to everyone present that far more children were living on Greville Road than anyone had known. That session, and the many more it prompted, also became the means by which adult residents got to know one another, which led to another revelation for Ferguson and Rose: In numerous ways, a world built for cars has made life so much harder for adults.

The dominance of cars has turned children’s play into work for parents, who are left coordinating and supervising their children’s time and ferrying kids to playgrounds and play dates. But it has also deprived adults of something more profound. Over the years, as Rose and Ferguson have expanded their experiment to other parts of the United Kingdom, neighborhoods across the country have discovered that allowing kids to play out in the open has helped residents reclaim something they didn’t know they were missing: the ability to connect with the people living closest to them.

M odern folks tend to think that streets serve largely mobile purposes—getting cars from one place to another in swift, orderly fashion. But “prior to the automobile, streets had a ton of stationary functions,” Marcel Moran, a faculty fellow at New York University’s Center for Urban Science and Progress, told me. Streets were where people sold wares and socialized. And particularly after the United States and Europe began to industrialize, streets were the primary location for the rising number of urban-dwelling children to play, according to Jon Winder, a historian and the author of Designed for Play: Children’s Playgrounds and the Politics of Urban Space, 1840–2010 . This remained the case in the U.K. and the U.S. even after playgrounds became widespread in the early 20th century. Only when cars hit the streets in larger numbers did things begin to change. Society, Winder told me, began prioritizing “the movement and storage of motor vehicles over children and their playful behavior.”

In the U.S., the ousting of children from the street was initially met with fierce resistance, Peter Norton, an associate history professor at the University of Virginia and the author of Fighting Traffic: The Dawn of the Motor Age in the American City , told me. In the 1920s, as pedestrian death tolls mounted, a number of American cities erected monuments to children killed in traffic, acknowledging their deaths as public losses the way we memorialize fallen soldiers. When cases involving these tragedies made their way to court, Norton said, judges routinely ruled that “a child has an absolute right to use the street, that it’s the responsibility of everyone else to watch out for the child. The parent does not have to be there.” He added that motorists who argued that they were not at fault, because the child had rushed out in front of them, were told, “That’s no excuse. You chose to operate a dangerous machine that gave you, the driver, the responsibility.”

Over time, however, deliberate efforts within the auto industry shifted the blame for traffic deaths to children and their parents. In the 1920s, the American Automobile Association dispensed free school-safety education materials aimed at teaching children that the road was not for them. Among other things, these curricula redefined the school-safety patrols run by older children tasked with escorting younger kids safely through the streets. Instead of walking into the street to stop traffic, kids were instructed to wait until there were no cars, then to cross. The message was that “if a child’s going to use the street at all, it’s only when there’s no cars,” Norton said. “This immediately became the excuse for raising speed limits.” By the 1940s, these curricula—still produced by AAA—cautioned children against even attempting to use streets at all. And it was hard to argue otherwise, Norton said, because the higher speed limits had in fact made roads quite dangerous.

The broader shift to a car-centric society only further undercut the notion that children have a place in or near the road, Norton told me. Suburbanization combined with school consolidation and court-ordered school busing meant that schools got farther apart, making it impractical for children to walk to them. In the 1980s, warnings about “stranger danger,” which intensified as news and crime shows stoked panic about child abductions, no doubt played a role in further curtailing children’s freedom—though stranger danger itself wasn’t new, Norton noted. Parents of the past relied on a combination of people—shopkeepers, residents, adults sitting on front steps—to keep an eye out for the rare unsavory character who might harm their kids. “But eyes on the street in the U.S., outside of a few surviving communities, is almost gone,” Norton said. “Eyes behind a windshield are no substitute.”

R ose and Ferguson’s project on Greville Road is of course not the first or only effort to reclaim the streets for children. In the U.K., play streets emerged roughly a century ago as a sort of compromise in the process of booting kids off the street. But after peaking in the 1960s, they largely dwindled out, to be revived only in the late 2000s. New York has had a play-streets program since 1914 , and Philadelphia for more than half a century—and recently, the idea has been taken up in other U.S. cities. Chicago launched a play-streets program in 2012 , followed by Los Angeles in 2015 ; an initiative in Portland, Oregon, hosted its first events in 2023 .

In the U.K., Rose, Ferguson, and their friend Ingrid Skeels expanded their experiment in 2011 by founding Playing Out , an organization that has helped residents on more than 1,000 streets in dozens of cities across the country set up their own play sessions. These typically last for two hours and occur weekly, biweekly, or monthly. And yes, as with any other sort of play these days, the process takes work: Residents who’d like to set up a play street must get buy-in from neighbors, agree on dates, book road closures well in advance, and recruit stewards to stand guard at either end of the block. Organizers are also working against the headwinds of a society unaccustomed to children playing in the street. Even when blocks are officially closed to traffic, stewards often have to address drivers frustrated that they can’t get through. Some residents ask why the kids can’t just go to the park, and they worry about the noise or what will happen to their cars. When Jo Chesterman, a Bristol-based mother of two, first broached the idea of a play session on her street several years ago, some neighbors, she told me, seemed to worry “it was maybe going to be like Lord of the Flies .”

But the street outside a child’s home is very different from a playground or a private yard. It’s a space that connects one home to another and is used by all residents, regardless of age or whether they have kids. On the street, Chesterman told me, kids learn how to find the homes of other children within walking distance. They also encounter children outside their own age group and a broader variety of adults. Rose’s daughter, Kaya, who just graduated from university but was 8 at the time of the inaugural play street, told me that mixing with younger kids afforded her opportunities to win the trust of their parents, which she otherwise wouldn’t have had, and that “feeling like the adults trusted us to look after their kids … made us trust those adults as well.” For the adults, Chesterman said, play streets make it “easier to get to know everyone, rather than wait to bump into each other when you’re doing the recycling.”

Read: Live closer to your friends

Surveys conducted by Alison Stenning, a professor of social and economic geography at Newcastle University who started studying the social impact of play streets after helping get one up and running in her own neighborhood, show that many play-street sessions manage to draw out nonparents as well. Sometimes, these connections lead to strong friendships. (Chesterman told me that on her street, plenty of play afternoons led to cozy social evenings with “far too much honey rum.”) But Stenning found that even where deep intimacy didn’t grow, neighbors did gain a more general “sense of knowing and being known”—which also has its value. Years ago, she told me, one rundown house at the end of her street, occupied by an older man and his sister, inspired rumors about who the two were and why their house looked so dilapidated. When the play streets started, the man occasionally emerged to watch the children and chat with the stewards stationed outside his house. There was no major breakthrough or kumbaya moment, but these small interactions helped demystify a slightly odd and somewhat-feared presence on the street.

S ome of this neighborly connection is likely the result of all the work and coordination involved in shutting a road to traffic. But it could also have something to do with the way children’s play alters the feel of the street, giving adults permission to engage in the sort of socializing “we’ve otherwise policed out,” Moran, of NYU, told me. Kids themselves function as a sort of “connective tissue for adults,” Moran said. This is true in the simple sense that when kids meet one another, their parents naturally connect. But children are also “very good at breaking down the learned reserve between adults,” Paul Tranter, an honorary associate professor at UNSW Canberra and the author of Slow Cities: Conquering Our Speed Addiction for Health and Sustainability , told me. Children’s tendency to violate social boundaries—to stare a little too long, ask someone an overly forward question, or wander into someone else’s yard—can nudge adults to reach across those boundaries too. It probably isn’t a coincidence that playgrounds are one of the few places in America where striking up a conversation with a stranger is considered socially acceptable and even expected. By siloing play there, we may have inadvertently undercut children’s capacity to bind us to one another.

In Chesterman’s neighborhood, after about four years, street-play sessions had so radically transformed the culture that the need for formal road closures fell away. “The vibe of the street is that [people] expect to see kids playing,” she said. But she suspects that this is possible largely because her road isn’t a through street, so most of the people driving on it actually live there.

Read: Surrendering our cities to cars would be a historic blunder

Her experience points to the limitations of play streets: For all their community benefits, they aren’t, in many places, sufficient to transform the way kids or adults use the street. On busier roads, play will always rely on a continuing rotation of people available to organize and steward formal closures. The sheer effort involved in coordinating them means that play streets sometimes fizzle out over time. Even on Greville Road, despite Rose and Ferguson’s deep commitment, weekly after-school sessions have dwindled to monthly Saturday afternoons. And in communities where people lack the time and resources necessary for sustaining regular traffic closures, play streets don’t happen at all.

This may be the ultimate finding of Rose and Ferguson’s experiment: Truly restoring a culture of street play will require society to make much more far-reaching, permanent changes to the built environment. It’s a daunting and perhaps impossible-sounding task. But it’s one that would meaningfully improve the well-being of children, of parents, of every person on the street.

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The Ever-Present Challenge of Escaping Poverty (with Noah Smith)

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John Cochrane on Economic Growth and Changing the Policy Debate

William easterly on growth, poverty, and aid, reader comments.

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Shalom Freedman

Aug 5 2024 at 8:11am.

Noah Smith joins the long company of those who have the one great idea that is most  important in the world. The Universe wants us to be poor and only with the coming ‘industrial modernity’ have we humans for a very brief time in all the time we and our ancestors have been here and have we been able to defy it. He is not of course wrong about the transformation which came in food production with the industrial revolution but he may well be wrong in thinking that calorie -poverty will forever be our greatest challenge. It is after all conceivable that the same kind of food-wealth which characterizes a great share of humanity today will cover everyone in the not so distant future.

At another point in the conversation Smith speaks about his experience in Japan and tells a dismal tale of how the Japanese family was destroyed by having the father enslaved to his workplace. Here Smith speaks about the relatively good condition of the American family, and I was surprised that Russ Roberts did not interject with some corrective information. It would have been enough just to mention one point perhaps about the increasing loneliness of Americans, or perhaps about the declining birth rate.

In any case this was a pleasant conversation with an abundance of interesting information especially regarding romantic fantasies about the supposed glorious good old days of the pre-industrial past.

Aug 6 2024 at 1:28am

thank you, Mr Roberts, for the enlightening talk, it reminded me back to the Common Sense reality and gave me some strength to oppose prevalent fantasies of the current media. One thing you haven’t mentioned, which I see as very relevant for the establishing of industrial modernity, is the institutional framework required for it. The agricultural lifestyle was horrible in many aspects, but one thing which it brought to the table (and why it survived and survives so well) was to some extent independence on others (to some extent, I know). When you make your own food, clothes, etc., you can sustain your existence without relying much on others. However, the moment, you suggest, that some citizen of the city should give up all their existence and just clean the shit from streets for living, you have to offer them some reliability of income. Will be there this job around in the next year, next ten years? Am I not giving up my only source of income for fantasy, which will go away with the next administration coming to power? Will this job survive the next plague or a wave of famine? Unless there is some institutional certainty, it is very difficult to start on some division of labour to the extent you can get some industrial modernity. Yes, I know this is to a large extent what New Institutional Economists, Douglas North (and Hernando de Soto) were saying, but it needs to be emphasized.

Yes, there were technological reasons (you cannot make a steam engine until you can make airtight machines, which requires exact machining unavailable until the eighteenth century, etc.), but I think there were mostly problems of lack of institutional framework, which could guarantee a peace required for the division of labour.

Thank you very much for the show again, it made me think, which is rare.

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Watch this podcast episode on YouTube:

• The Ever-Present Challenge of Escaping Poverty (with Noah Smith) . Live-recorded audio and video.

This week's guest:

• Noah Smith's Home page . Blog, Substack.
• Noah Smith on X . (Twitter)
• Noah Smith's EconTalk Episodes .

This week's focus:

• "The elemental foe," by Noah Smith. Noahpinion, Jun. 30, 2024.
• "Toward a shallower future," by Noah Smith. Noahpinion, Jan. 3, 2024.
• "There's not that much wealth in the world," by Noah Smith. Noahpinion, Jul. 13, 2024.

Additional ideas and people mentioned in this podcast episode:

• "Frontier House." Reality TV show. . Wikipedia.
• "I, Pencil," by Leonard Read. Introduction by Milton Friedman .

A few more readings and background resources:

• "How Do You Know He's a King?" Clip from Monty Python and the Holy Grail. YouTube .

A few more EconTalk podcast episodes:

More related EconTalk podcast episodes, by Category:

• Technology and Information
• International Development and Third World Poverty
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Time	Podcast Episode Highlights
0:37	Intro. [Recording date: July 17, 2024.] Today is July 17th, 2024. My guest is economist Noah Smith. He writes at Substack at Noahpinion, N-O-A-H-P-I-N-I-O-N, Noahpinion. This is Noah's fourth appearance on EconTalk. He was last here in January of 2024 discussing whether a nation can plunder its way to wealth. Our topic for today is poverty, what Noah calls in his essay at Noahpinion on this topic the 'elemental foe.' Noah, welcome back to EconTalk. Hey, great to be back. I want to warn parents listening with children, this episode may touch on adult themes or language.
1:18	Why do you call it the 'elemental foe'? It's kind of grand, and I happen to think it deserves that grandeur. But, why did you use that wording? That phrase comes from the--Dr. Frankenstein. So, the titular character, Dr. Frankenstein, is on an expedition, I believe, to the Arctic, and he writes about data that he's going to get that will help humanity against the 'elemental foes of our race.' And, he means the elements themselves. He's talking about cold. How can people better survive the cold? And the idea is that humans are born into a universe where the elements themselves are against us. Poverty is the elemental foe, not just because it's the fundamental or basic foe, but because the universe itself is always trying to kill us with rocks from space and diseases and just hunger that reappears every few hours. Yeah, it's an interesting, thought-provoking observation, that we're all able to absorb. Early on in the essay, you say the following. Quote: --farms, granaries, houses, water treatment systems, electric power stations--we will exist at the level of wild animals. This is simply physics. [Emphasis original.] I think that's undeniable. But you, with that stark language, make it very clear what our challenge is as human beings living on a rock. Yeah. That's--I mean, that's our condition in the world, right? If you look at the planets out there in the solar system, Mars or whatever, they're just sterile. Right? Life is rare. And, even on earth, when life exists, most of it exists at a level of just absolute poverty. Animals always on the verge of starvation or predation. You know, that's the only way that animal populations get controlled. And then, when you look at human history, for most of human history, essentially everybody was living in grinding poverty. You know, even--I guess, this is kind of a cliché to point out--but even kings: kings had enough to eat and they had servants to do stuff for them. But, at the same time, because of lack of modern technology, they were still carried away by disease all the time. And they were still probably malnourished, honestly--subject to heavy disease burden as kids that stunted their intelligence and physical health. You know, we're just--a regular American is better off than a king of yesteryear, even if they have less servants. Right? And so-- We have servants that aren't human that work often much more effectively than the physical servants of the past, say, cleaning clothes, washing dishes, and the many things we've automated. That's true. And so, the default state for much of the world--yanno, history, all of life--is poverty. There's only a tiny little bit of non-poverty in the universe. We live in a tiny little pocket of non-poverty in the universe. Everywhere else is constantly just on the verge of death. You know, everywhere.
5:09	I never thought about it. The lion is king of the jungle, but the lion's stardard of living is subsistence. If you find a nice herd, you might have a good day. You might even have a good couple of days. But, you can't rise above the minimum with any success because you have no technology. Is, of course--as we'll talk about what makes human beings able to imagine and then experience a standard of living that is well above subsistence requires going well beyond the natural--our natural gifts of being able to walk upright, having an opposable thumb. These are all nice things--and a brain. But if you don't have tools and those tools don't improve, you stagnate. And, most of human history--as I once heard, George Will say it, 'Most of human history is, a man, if lucky, a man standing behind a horse, walking behind the horse, looking at the horse's rear while it pulls a plow.' That's like--that's good times. And, for most of human history, that's as good as it got. And, that meant-- Right. You've seen right? Absolutely. I think that the best line about economic development and economic history ever uttered is uttered in that movie, where someone says, 'How do you know he's the king?' And, someone else says, 'He hasn't got shit all over him.' Yeah. That's a blunt way to describe pre-industrial life. It's a good point. And, ate off better dishes than the rest of us, of course, as well, and had more to eat. But, it was limited. The castle was bigger than the hubble, but the castle was cold, except in those handful of rooms where they would have a fire burning in that area. What? Then it's smoky. You didn't have a thermostat. Yeah, we live like the kings of yesteryear. I mean, we have jobs; we've got work. But I guess, kings officially had jobs and had to work, too. A lot of kings worked really hard. We don't always have people always trying to kill us for our inheritance. It's like: the reason you have Game-of-Thrones-type of situations with people trying to kill the king all the time is because you're competing for, like, the one non-poverty position in society. [More to come, 8:00]

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JD Vance Vs. ‘Cat Ladies’ And The Childless: VP Candidate’s Views Explained As Wife Defends Comments

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The wife of GOP vice presidential candidate Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, on Monday defended comments her husband made denouncing Vice President Kamala Harris and others as “childless cat ladies” who don’t have a “direct stake” in the country’s future—which reflects a worldview that has affected Vance’s policy views as he stands to be a heartbeat away from the presidency.

Sen. J.D. Vance, R-Ohio, holds a campaign rally at Radford University on July 22 in Radford, ... [+] Virginia.

Vance condemned Harris and other Democrats as “childless cat ladies” who “want to make the rest of the country miserable too” in a Fox News interview from 2021—repeating a line of attack that he’s repeatedly made on social media and in other public comments , also saying in 2021, “We should give miserable, childless lefties less control over our country and its kids” and that a “lack of babies … means our leaders are miserable.”

His wife, Usha Vance, defended Vance’s comments to Fox News in an interview that aired Monday, saying she “took a moment ... to try to understand what the context was” and claimed what Vance was “really saying” is “that it can be really hard to be a parent in this country. And sometimes our policies are designed in a way that makes it even harder.”

The VP hopeful’s comments reflect broader policy views from Vance, who during his political tenure has repeatedly pushed policies that would encourage families to have children and economically benefit parents.

Tax Policy: Vance supported a higher tax rate for childless adults in a 2021 podcast appearance, ABC News reports , and has also backed an expansion of child tax credits for low-income families and a proposal by Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., that would give married parents a $12,000 tax credit.

Healthcare: Vance introduced legislation in the Senate that would protect healthcare coverage for parents during their post-childbirth leave, and has also supported “universal childbirth” policies that would eliminate out-of-pocket costs during childbirth—though The Washington Post reports Vance ended bipartisan talks for legislation on that issue when he got closer to securing the vice presidential nomination.

Childcare: Though he’s supported policies to pay for childbirth, the senator has been staunchly opposed to “universal childcare” proposals that would eliminate costs for childcare, calling it a “massive subsidy to the lifestyle preferences of the affluent over the preferences of the middle and working class” in a 2021 post on X.

Married Couple Loan Forgiveness: Vance has touted a policy enacted in Hungary, in which the government provides loans to newly married couples, and then forgives those loans based on how many children the couple has or if they stay together for a certain number of years—a policy endorsement that has garnered some criticism , as the Hungarian proposal echoes a similar policy that was enacted in the 1920s and 30s by Italian Fascist Party leader Benito Mussolini.

Abortion: Vance is opposed to abortion and endorsed a national ban in 2022, saying on a podcast he “certainly would like abortion to be illegal nationally,” though more recently he has backed former President Donald Trump’s view that the issue should be left to the states.

No-Fault Divorce: Though he has not explicitly called for repealing no-fault divorce laws, Vance argued in a 2021 appearance that “children suffered” because of more relaxed views around divorce that started in the 1970s and as couples have increasingly viewed marriage as a “basic contract,” calling for a return to valuing marriage as “sacred” in order to preserve American families.

Economy: In that same appearance, Vance called for the U.S. to rebuild its “manufacturing economy” and create stable jobs for blue-collar workers in order to preserve marriage stability, after saying he believes that “moms and dads really are different” and that the U.S. losing “a lot of stable male employment” was “catastrophic” for the American family.

Voting Rights: Vance said in a 2021 speech he believed parents should have more voting power than childless voters, arguing, “If you don’t have as much of an investment in the future of this country, maybe you shouldn’t get nearly the same voice.”

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Crucial Quote

In comments to right-wing journalist Megyn Kelly about his “childless cat ladies” comments going viral, Vance said his remarks were “obviously … a sarcastic comment” and he has “nothing against cats,” but defended his broader views. “People are focusing so much on the sarcasm and not on the substance … and the substance of what I said, Megyn — I’m sorry, it is true,” Vance said .

Vance’s views that emphasize the importance of married families with children echo views espoused by the Heritage Foundation, a private right-wing organization with close ties to Vance that’s recently come under fire for its 900-page policy agenda for a second Trump presidency known as “ Project 2025 .” The Heritage Foundation has publicly called for “encouraging marriage at the front end of a woman’s childbearing years” in order to increase the birth rate, and Project 2025 heavily emphasizes the importance of the nuclear family and imposing policies that strengthen it. The policy blueprint calls for ending “LGBTQ equity” initiatives and others in the Department of Health and Human Services and “replacing such policies with those encouraging marriage, work, motherhood, fatherhood, and nuclear families,” for instance, along with restricting abortion rights and eliminating federal healthcare mandates around contraception coverage. About the Heritage Foundation’s proposals, Vance spokesperson Taylor Van Kirk told Forbes, “The views of any outside group have zero effect on JD’s policy positions—full stop.” Vance’s office also directed Forbes to comments Vance has made noting Project 2025 has no affiliation with the Trump campaign and saying he thinks “there’s some good ideas in there” and “there’s some things that I disagree with.”

Chief Critic

Vance’s comments denouncing “childless cat ladies” have drawn widespread condemnation from the left, particularly from female voters. Actress Jennifer Aniston attacked Vance’s comments in an Instagram post saying she “truly can’t believe that this is coming from a potential VP of the United States” telling Vance, “I pray that your daughter is fortunate enough to bear children of her own one day.” Former Rep. Gabby Giffords, D-Ariz., also criticized Vance on X, saying she is a “proud mom” of stepchildren—like Harris—and she and husband Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., were trying to conceive through in vitro fertilization before she was shot in 2011. “To suggest we are somehow lesser is disgraceful,” Giffords said. While Harris has not commented on his attacks directly, her stepdaughter Ella Emhoff posted an Instagram story saying, “How can you be ‘childless’ when you have cutie pie kids like Cole and I,” referring to her brother. “I love my three parents,” she added. Harris also garnered a significant amount of high-profile support from female voters in her campaign’s opening days as Vance’s comments first went viral, with more than 100,000 women joining a Zoom call Thursday to support the Harris campaign and fans of Taylor Swift mobilizing for the vice president.

What We Don’t Know

How Vance’s policy views would actually affect a potential Trump presidency. The vice presidential candidate is likely to fall in line with Trump’s chosen policy agenda, and the ex-president has publicly espoused more moderate positions than Vance on issues like abortion, calling for the issue to be left up to the states. (Abortion rights advocates believe he may take harsher action if elected, however.) Trump has also publicly distanced himself from Project 2025 and its more extreme proposals, though many involved with his first presidential administration helped author the policy agenda.

Key Background

Trump named Vance as his vice presidential candidate on July 15 as the Republican National Convention was underway, siding with allies like son Donald Trump Jr., who had pushed for Vance to be the nominee over more moderate choices like Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., and North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum. Vance was elected to the Senate in 2022 and was previously best known as the author of memoir “ Hillbilly Elegy .” He notably spoke out against Trump in the 2016 election before he ultimately claimed his views had changed and he now strongly supports the ex-president. Trump’s selection of Vance has come under increasing scrutiny as his more extreme views have gone viral and as President Joe Biden dropped out of the 2024 presidential race and endorsed Harris, shaking up a contest that polling previously suggested could go more easily for Trump. The vice presidential candidate has struggled in the polls , with CNN reporting he is the least-liked vice presidential nominee post-convention since 1980, and The Hill reported even some House Republicans denounced him as Trump’s running mate.

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